JENNY HOLL has been faced with some pretty life changes recently. In the past couple of months, the 18 year-old cyclist has upped sticks from her family home in Stirling and relocated to British Cycling’s training base in Manchester, a place that has also been dubbed the ‘medal factory’, such is its record for producing world and Olympic medallists.

While still a school pupil, Holl had been a member of the GB Junior Academy, which involved occasional trips to the Manchester velodrome for training weekends but a few months ago, an email from British Cycling arrived that would change her life.

“I was away competing at a stage race and I got an email from British Cycling,” she recalls. “I couldn’t open it though because I was so nervous about what it might say so I got my friend to open it for me. She read it and then said - you’re going to Manchester. I just started running around and screaming – I was so excited and I couldn’t wait to get down there.”

Being promoted to the GB Senior Academy meant that she would now be based in Manchester permanently and would be funded to train full-time, a privilege that almost any cyclist in the country would give their right arm for.

Tomorrow though, Holl will be back in Scotland to compete in the Glasgow leg of the Revolution Champions League, which takes place in the Sir Chris Hoy velodrome in Glasgow. There are few opportunities for Scotland’s top cyclists to ride in front of a home crowd and with an incredibly strong field that includes Olympic medallists such as Lizzie Deignan, Ed Clancy and Elinor Barker, it is shaping up to be an incredibly exciting day of racing and one that Holl cannot wait to be a part of. “I’m really looking forward to it, it should be good because I really like the Revolutions,” she said. “There is a scratch race, a points race, a madison elimination - which will be super exciting and possibly a little bit crazy as well - and also a madison time trial which should also be really good. There might be a couple more events going on too so it will be pretty full on. It’s brilliant to be back racing in Scotland- it’s a great track in Glasgow so I can’t wait to get going.”

Holl has been in sparkling form in 2017. The teenager broke the Scottish 2000m record earlier in the summer while just a few weeks later, she won bronze medals in the scratch race and the madison at the European Junior Track Championships.

Since moving to Manchester, her progress has continued and last month, she made her debut in a World Cup event, racing in the team pursuit in Manchester which was another major step in her career.

There is much improvement still to come though, and being surrounded by word class cyclists day in, day out at the Manchester velodrome certainly helps her motivation. “It’s pretty cool being around all of these amazing riders,” Holl admits.

“We have Katie Archibald and Elinor Barker in a lot of our track sessions which is really great because sometimes they say things and mention little pointers about what we could do to get faster and it’s just brilliant to have that. So much of the advice they give I would never have thought of myself but then they mention it and it’s so helpful. Little things can make a big difference in this sport so it’s fantastic having them pointing them out. What’s great is to think how much room for improvement I still have.”