Sammie Maxwell's sabatical highlights athlete mental health
Maxwell isn't the only racer stepping away from the sport in the prime of her career
Samara “Sammie” Maxwell is taking a sabatical break from World Cup cross country racing in 2026, the Decathlon-Ford Racing Team announced last week. Maxwell won the 2025 XCO overall title, making such a step unusual, but her decision highlights a growing awareness of athlete mental health in professional cycling.
“This is the right moment for me to pause, breathe, and return to my roots,” Maxwell said in the announcement. “I want to spend time with my family, recharge, and prepare myself for the challenges ahead.”
The Decathlon-Ford team said that “the New Zealand athlete will dedicate 2026 to a period of rest, recovery nd personal reconnection. During this sabbatical pause, she will step away from racing, media activities, social platforms, and public engagements. This choice will allow her to restore physical energy, regain mental balance, and spend meaningful time with the people and places that matter most to her.”
Maxwell, who opened the World Cup season last spring with a win, two second places, and an 8th place, has been vocal about her struggles with mental health and an eating disorder. After the string of early-season success, she wrote: “I don’t want these results to lure me (or young aspiring athletes) into thinking everything is okay with my body, and bury my head in the sand again.”
The 24-year-old Maxwell isn’t the only racer to step away from the race track at the height of her career. After winning the 2016 Olympic Games, Jenny Rissveds took an extended break from the sport for mental health reasons. Since returning, Rissveds has found massive success, including four XCO victories in 2025.
Maxwell still plans to target the 2028 Olympic Games in Los Angeles and maintains the full backing of her team and the New Zealand cycling federation. The announcement comes weeks after Fem van Empel stepped away from cyclocross in the middle of the season.
At 23 years old, Van Empel is the current cyclocross world champion, but the Dutch star nonetheless decided to take an indefinite step away from the sport and the Visma-Lease a Bike team.
"This is a well-considered decision that I feel good about,” Van Empel said. “At the moment, both the motivation and the enjoyment I have had in cycling for years are missing,"
The Visma squad is also losing Simon Yates, the 2025 Giro d’Italia winner and a key teammate of previous tour de France winner Jonas Vingegaard. Yates did not elaborate much on why he’s retiring early, but it seems to be related to potential burnout.
“As I understand it, he lost his desire [for cycling],” a team coach said of Yates, who also won the Vuelta a Espana in his 12-year-long pro career.
From training, dieting, and finding the slimmest marginal gains to the intense presure of racing, the mental battles of athletes can be some of the toughest. Athlete mental health entered the mainstream in the past with Olympians like Simone Biles, who withdrew from the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo due to mental strain.
Maxwell appears to be taking a healthy approach, stepping away despite undoubtedly facing pressure to back up her 2025 results.
We’ll no doubt continue to hear more about the mental toll of performing at the highest level in the cycling space, especially as the race to qualify for the 2028 Olympics looms in future seasons.