This article was produced in association with MAAP
By day, Melissa Martucci is a teacher in a school in South Los Angeles. She goes to work early and comes home like any other person in a normal job, but outside of working hours, Martucci is pursuing an entirely different dream.
Like many, the American woman had grown up watching the Olympics. It wasn’t cycling that had captured Martucci’s attention all those years ago, however, but soccer. The literal and figurative goal was making it to the Olympics and playing for the US soccer team, something that dominated Martucci’s life throughout her formative years.
“I wanted to get a scholarship to play soccer in college, as you can then go to college for free. My parents didn’t have a lot of money growing up and so that was something I really aspired to,” she explains.“I made it to Missouri's Olympic development team for soccer when I was 15 and literally, a couple months later, I blew my knee out. I tore my ACL as a kid, and had to have this massive surgery.”
Martucci explains that the surgery didn’t go well, and her parents ended up needing to take her to appointments daily, which put a strain on the family’s finances and work commitments. When she went to college, Martucci struggled to let the dream of making it to the national soccer team go, and she continued to play, putting more pressure on her knee and requiring a subsequent two more surgeries.
“I had my third knee surgery and I kind of gave up soccer after that. I found my career as a teacher, but I needed a hobby,” Martucci explains. “In my second year as a teacher I went through a divorce and it was really earth-shattering. I needed something to fill my time when I moved to a different town and so I bought a bike. I just rode back and forth, I didn’t know what I was doing. I met people in the cycling community that showed me how to do things.”
Fast forward seven years and Martucci is now a Red Bull Short Circuit champion [a prestigious fixed-year criterium event] and she’s training to make it into the US Olympic sprint team with her eyes on a spot in the 2028 LA Olympics. It’s been a whirlwind ride to the top of the sport.
“I think my career as a cyclist really took off when I started dating my current husband, and he was teaching me things. I felt this sense of empowerment which really opened up the possibilities of what I could be. He saw that I really loved the sport, but I was actually pretty terrible at first,” Martucci remembers.
“I crashed in a race we both did and messed up my front teeth. He was like, if you want to continue, let me help you learn how to handle your bike because you could be really good. That’s when I started to learn and win some races.”
Although Martucci found a home in the fixed gear criterium scene, which she admits was more welcoming than the road scene and had an “all round better vibe”, the Olympic dream she had as a child never quite went away. In February of this year, Martucci saw that USA Cycling were hosting a Talent ID programme to identify track cycling sprinters, putting on camps around Southern California.
“After the initial tryouts, there were five women selected from the nation to come do a week-long tryout, which happened this past August. There was power testing, Wattbike testing. We had to go to the gym and they did a lot of gym testing,” Martucci says. “Of the five women, I was the one selected to move to the integration phase with the US national team. In January, I have a four month block of training with the national team and more testing. My goal – it will be very difficult – is to get to the LA 2028 Olympics for velodrome track sprinting.”
This new development Martucci’s cycling career has forced some big lifestyle changes for the American woman. She explains that she has gained ten kilograms since February after spending so much time in the gym, and she’s had to learn to deal with the stress of a volatile, cut-throat, high-performance environment where riders are removed from the programme quickly if they aren’t making their time goals.
“If you don't meet the standard that they set in four months, they're going to pick a new candidate. It's really cool to have made it this far, and I am definitely going to keep pushing as much as I can, because I've wanted to go to the Olympics since I was a kid,” Martucci smiles. “It's not for soccer, but here I am trying to be an Olympic track sprinter.”
Although she is motivated and ambitious, Martucci is under no illusions that the path to the Olympics is going to be easy. She speaks about the challenges she faces as an older rider trying to pursue her dreams as an athlete, and the limited budget in US track sprinting.
“I had no idea I would be here today because cycling just started out for my mental health. It's weird to see where the road has gone, but I couldn't be more grateful for it. Now it's becoming like, how far does the mountain peak go?” Martucci says.
“The talk about having children always comes up. I'm a woman athlete trying to pursue her dreams, but I also have a husband and I'm 36 years old. That's why I said getting to the Olympics will be very difficult, because I've never heard of a 40-year-old-track sprinter that has made it. There's a lot of chips stacked up against me, but I've definitely been a person to always fight for what I want. There are some fears there, but, but at the end of the day, if I don't chase this dream, I'm always going to wonder ‘what if’ and I don't know if that will sit very well with me later in life.”
Martucci also faces the choice of whether she will need to give up her teaching job next year in order to fully commit herself to the rigorous training programme as part of the US track cycling team. She’s currently in talks with sponsors and aiming to fundraise to help support her dream, as well as targeting some fixed gear events with big prize purses which she can put towards her Olympic goals.
It’s fair to say that it is going to be a long, tough road to the top for Martucci. Regardless of whether she gets there, however, the American woman will always leave a lasting legacy on her sport. She and her husband, Francesco, are founders of the non-profit organisation, Gruppetto, an LA-based team which aims to give opportunities within cycling to those from disadvantaged backgrounds.
“We started Gruppetto because we have a lot of cyclists that come from fixed gear roots who find it hard to start a career because they're financially ill-equipped to buy a road bike which is $6,000 and then pay for the licence, and then pay for the road fees,” Martucci says.
“There are kids that have a fixed gear bike and they're really, really, good. Our goal is to support those athletes that come up through fixed gear, or even any athlete that we see talent in, that is having trouble accessing the road community and would like a chance at going pro.”
Martucci explains that she and her husband have both received support from the community throughout their careers and feel an obligation to give back to help the next generation. While Francesco identifies talent and takes up a coaching role in Gruppetto, Melissa currently works on supporting the women’s community within the organisation.
“I think that the women's community still really struggles. My goal is, through encouragement and building relationships with the different women I find, to them to the start line together, because the women's community really struggles out here showing up to a start line,” Martucci says. “A lot of that is fear, anxiety, not feeling accepted or good enough. But we all start somewhere, the more women that show up to the line or that show up to group rides, the better off our community is as a whole.”
Above all, Martucci’s story is one that should inspire anyone to chase their dreams, regardless of gender, age or background. In less than a decade, Martucci has learnt to ride a bike, ingrained herself in a community that she is already helping to give back to, and isn’t letting anything stop her from fighting for what she wants.
“The goal here is to make it known that you can start off with a fixed gear bike, a $400 bike, and you can make your dreams come true,” Martucci says. “I think that so many people in the sport get discouraged because they can't afford the nice things. I literally was racing in the streets at night, and came from absolutely nothing.
“At the very end of this, if I don't make it, my hope is that there are kids that can see my story. I work in a South Los Angeles and a lot of my students' families are immigrants and first generation college goers and some struggle financially. They look up to me and say, ‘wow, Miss, you didn't even know how to ride a bike seven years ago!’ I try to show them that they can do it too if they push really hard, learn how to be a business person and present themselves in a way that is appealing to sponsors. If you want to do this, like me, you can push yourself to go as high as you want to go.”
