Other Ways to Win (ePub)

Lee Craigie was born and raised in Glasgow. She began cycling while at school and discovered mountain biking in 2006. She went on to compete internationally in cross-country mountain biking and represented Great Britain at the 2011 and 2012 World Championships. She joined the Cannondale team in 2013 and later that year became the British champion after winning the senior women's race at the British championships in Glasgow. Lee represented Scotland at the 2014 Commonwealth Games, and in 2016 she became the UK 24-hour MTB champion. After retiring from full-time racing, she went on to set records on several self-supported bikepacking races at home and abroad. In 2009, Lee founded Cycletherapy, a Scottish Government-supported project that used mountain biking to engage marginalised young people in the Scottish Highlands. In 2016, she launched The Adventure Syndicate to offer an alternative female sporting role model and was part of the women's team that set a record time for the North Coast 500. She co-founded Velocity Cafe and Bicycle Workshop in Inverness, Cargo Bike Movement in Edinburgh and hosted the series Life Cycle on BBC Radio Scotland. She is an ambassador for the charity Venture Trust and uses her work with the Adventure Syndicate to inspire adolescent girls to be more physically active outdoors. Between 2018 and 2022 she was Scotland's Active Nation Commissioner, working independently of government to ensure the provision of fair, accessible spaces where everyone in Scotland can benefit from being everyday active, promoting the health, environmental, social and economic benefits to everyone who lives, works in or visits Scotland. Lee and her work have been featured in The Scotsman, BBC News, The Press and Journal, and The Courier, and in publications Waymaking and Imagine a Country. And she rides bikes. A lot.