BMX rider’s mother says gold medal win ‘like a dream’

The 25-year-old former cook from Manchester landed the first-ever 360 backflip to claim success in the BMX freestyle in Tokyo on Sunday.

Speaking to Times Radio, her mother Sarah said: “It’s just a bit like a dream, really.

“I mean, I could sort of tell that yesterday all the riders were keeping their cards close to their chest.

“I knew that she’d got all these things in her but it didn’t really show in yesterday’s run and she looked very serious and everything.

“Then when she did her first run today and she had the fall doing that new trick of that 360 thing I wasn’t sure whether she’d even get a medal really, because I thought how do you come back from having a fall like that and it looked like it might have hurt.

“So I was just absolutely amazed.

“But I could sort of tell when she started off on that second run, she was smiling and everything and somehow she’s just managed to get back and just show everybody what she can do.”

Mrs Worthington said she had a couple of hours sleep before getting up in the early hours to watch her daughter.

She added: “I’ll have to get some sleep, the dog will need a walk later.”

In 2018, Worthington was working full-time as a chef at Racconto Lounge in Bury.

Speaking on Sunday morning, her former manager, Jordan Carter, 28, told the PA news agency: “I feel really proud of her, it’s made me really happy.”

He said she worked at the restaurant for about six months before leaving to pursue her BMX career.

He said: “She was fantastic. We knew she was into BMX and she was going to enter the Olympics.

“She didn’t speak about it a lot, she was quite reserved in some aspects and it was just one of those interesting facts about her.”

Worthington’s former headteacher Zoe Morris, from Chorlton High School, wrote on Twitter that her performance was “inspirational”, adding: “That was stunning!”