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US Olympian and three-time world track cycling champion Kelly Catlin has died aged 23.
Key points:
- Her father said Catlin died by suicide at her California home
- USA Cycling said her passing was a "devastating loss" for the cycling community
- Catlin won a silver medal with the US pursuit team at the 2016 Olympics, and three gold medals at world championships
Catlin helped the US win the women's pursuit team silver medal at the 2016 Rio Olympics.
She also won gold medals with the team at the 2016, 2017 and 2018 world championships.
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Catlin's father, Mark, said in a letter to VeloNews that she took her own life at her home in California on Friday.
USA Cycling president and chief executive Rob DeMartini said the country's cycling community had suffered a "devastating loss".
"Kelly was more than an athlete to us, and she will always be part of the USA Cycling family," the statement read.
"Our thoughts and prayers are with the Catlin family. This is an incredibly difficult time and we want to respect their privacy.
"The entire cycling community is mourning this immense loss."
Catlin, who was pursuing a degree in computational and mathematical engineering at Stanford University while training for track cycling, recently wrote in a journal entry for VeloNews about her struggles managing her time.
"Being a graduate student, track cyclist, and professional road cyclist can instead feel like I need to time-travel to get everything done," she wrote.
"After all, I somehow make everything work, right? Sure. Yeah, that's somewhat accurate. But the truth is that most of the time, I don't make everything work."
Australian cycling champion Anna Meares sent her condolences on Twitter.
Reuters/ABC
Topics: cycling, sport, olympics-summer, suicide, community-and-society, united-states
First posted