I HARDLY recognised the waif-like young woman walking her horse across the yard to join a string of top-class jockeys for their morning workout on the famous Newmarket gallops.
The last time I saw Victoria Pendleton she was crying her eyes out on the 2012 series of Strictly Come Dancing — for the umpteenth time — after TV viewers voted her off.
Three years later she has been transformed.
She has shed nearly a stone, cropped and lightened her long, dark hair and those bulging thighs that powered her to Olympic gold at London 2012 have disappeared.
But above all, she is now smiling constantly.
At 34, Victoria is having the time of her life after swapping cycle racing for horse racing.
Unbelievably, six months ago she had never ridden a horse but next March she looks set to be a jockey at the Cheltenham Festival.
She told me: “I will always be competitive. There’s only so much housework, gardening and dog-walking you can do. I was looking for a new challenge — something to fill the gap that cycling left.
“I absolutely love being around horses — even the naughty ones that bite you on the bum when you lean over to clean their feet out.”
Earlier this week Victoria was in the saddle cantering alongside Britain’s top woman jockey Hayley Turner, 32, up Warren Hill gallops on the hill above Newmarket.
And yesterday she was out riding again, this time in front of assessors from the British Horseracing Authority, who she hopes will grant her a licence to ride against amateur jockeys in races all over the country.
If Victoria is awarded her Category A papers, she will race in the Betfair Amateur Series on the flats at Ripon on Bank Holiday Monday.
Last Tuesday morning, under the watchful eye of trainer Michael Bell, she put Sampera, a three-year-old filly, through her paces.
As she galloped twice up Warren Hill, Hayley was beside her on Banzari, and up ahead the string of horses was led by Big Orange, Bell’s hope to win the Melbourne Cup in Australia in November.
Victoria says: “I feel really honoured. It’s like a Sunday league footballer being allowed to train with a Premier League player.”
Later, back at Bell’s Fitzroy House stables, Victoria un-tacked her mount like she had been doing it all her life, leading the horse into the stall next to one of the Queen’s young hopefuls, Merriment.
That smile was there again as she said: “Usually I’m quite a bubbly, enthusiastic person but when I went into Strictly I was mentally and physically exhausted. I went into training for Strictly just five days after finishing the Olympics.
“I was like a space cadet half the time I was on the show.”
After her seven-week stint on the BBC1 ballroom favourite she spent two years doing all the things she was banned from doing while she was a member of the GB cycling team.
That meant running — which she was not allowed to do in case she injured her legs — and going to the movies, which had been banned in case she caught an infection in a crowded auditorium.
It was two years before she could even bear to get her racing bike back out of the shed.
Betfair approached Victoria six months ago with the idea of her training to ride a race horse at more than 30mph over the three-mile course in the Foxhunter Chase at Cheltenham. It was a challenge the eternal athlete could not refuse.
Sat under a framed photo of Bell’s 2005 Derby winner Motivator in the kitchen behind an office, she hugs a cup of milky tea — while giving the croissants a wide berth.
Victoria reveals the idea of working with horses was also a childhood dream. She said: “My mum always saw me with a smallholding surrounded by lots of retired greyhounds or race horses.
“At 15 I wanted to work on a farm — that was my career option.
“I did a week’s work experience at a farm centre where I spent the week shovelling different types of poo. I asked Dad for a pony for my birthday when I was little but he gave me a bike and said, ‘You’ll never have to muck out a bike’.”
But she only learned to ride after accepting the Cheltenham challenge, under the direction of Yogi Breisner, Team GB’s equestrian expert, who trains Zara Phillips.
Now working six days a week with racehorse trainer Lawney Hill at her yard in Aston Rowant, Oxon, she is learning fast.
She said: “Before I was allowed to ride out at Newmarket, I went on to the gallops just to watch.
“It was a beautiful hazy spring morning, rays of sun were coming through the tree tops.
“There seemed to be thousands and thousands of horses, they just kept on coming. It was still a bit cold and you could see the horses’ breath. It was magical. I was hooked.”
By last month she was good enough to ride Mighty Mambo in the George Frewer Charity Race at Newbury.
She came a respectable eighth, in the middle of the finishers.
She said: “It took longer getting ready than it did to race. It was over in the blink of an eye.
“It was the same as my first bike race. You get off and think, ‘No!’ You’re so excited. You are trying to do everything right and it passes at lightning speed. And you think, ‘I want to do that again’.”
Victoria’s training regime means her leg muscles — built up in a lifetime of cycling — have vanished. She now weighs 8st 10oz, nearly a stone under her Olympic weight.
So far she has suffered no injuries, although over her career her new friend Hayley has broken almost every bone in her body.
Hayley said: “It’s amazing what Victoria has done in six months. It took me about 16 years.
“A lot of people when they first begin are nervous and they grab the horse’s neck to avoid falling off but Victoria didn’t. She’s very relaxed in the saddle.”
After Victoria’s race at Ripon on August 31 — the second anniversary of her wedding to GB cycling’s sports scientist Scott Gardner — Victoria moves on to her next phase.
She plans to spend the winter competing over jumps at point-to-point races the length and breadth of Britain. And all those jumps almost certainly means some falls.
But Victoria is undaunted: “Let’s face it, falls are inevitable when you have a bunch of amateur riders jumping over fences. I accept that as part of the challenge. It’s dangerous but awesome fun.
“The first time you go over a fence it feels like you are actually flying. There would be no reward in trying if it was easy.”
To follow Victoria’s journey with Betfair visit and support her on Twitter using #SwitchingSaddles.
Timeline
HERE are the major dates in Victoria’s transformation from cycling ace to Cheltenham jockey.
August 2012
Quits cycling after winning cycling track gold and silver medals at London 2012.
March 9, 2015
Has first riding lesson with Team GB’s Yogi Breisner.
May
Begins training with trainers Lawney and Alan Hill at their Oxfordshire yard.
July 2
First race. Comes eighth in the George Frewer Charity Stakes at Newbury.
August 19
Begins Category A jockey licence assessment at Newmarket.
August 31
Due to take part in her first proper race in the Betfair Amateur series at Ripon.
Winter 2015-16
Hopes to ride in 20 point-to-point races from November to February.
March 18, 2016
Victoria’s ultimate goal – the Fox-hunter Steeple Chase, which runs straight after the Gold Cup at the Cheltenham Festival.