EDMONTON (CP) - The dazzling smile that has become part Olympic champion Lori-Ann Muenzer's public image broke just once as she announced her retirement from competitive cycling Monday.
"Today I'm retiring the Olympic bike," Muenzer said, gesturing to the $12,000 custom-made bicycle that helped propel her at age 38 to a sprint gold medal at the 2004 Athens Summer Games.
It was only after the microphones were turned off, as she passed the bike she rode to Olympic glory, that Muenzer's face crumpled slightly - and only briefly - before she used some of the grit that made her a champion to marshal her emotions.
After dedicating most of her adult life to competitive cycling, Muenzer now plans to concentrate on her company Pure Momentum Inc., which promotes Canadian female motivational speakers like Juno award-winning recording artists Sass Jordan and Carole Pope.
She'll also devote time to a program she's established to develop young cyclists.
Getting to the top of the cycling world had meant giving up hobbies like recreational skiing, so Muenzer hopes to get back to them now that she doesn't have a gruelling training schedule.
"I went rock climbing on the weekend, just for something different to do," she told reporters at Edmonton City Hall.
"There are so many opportunities of other things that I'd like to do, and I've been wanting to do, but have had to put on hold."
Leaving the sport that has consumed her for over 17 years wasn't an easy decision for the Toronto native who now lives in Edmonton.
"I really thought long and hard about it," Muenzer, 40, told The Canadian Press in an interview prior to her news conference. "To be able to have the ultimate performance you have to have so many things in alignment to make it happen.
"Over this past year and a half I have been trying to figure out how to get those ducks in alignment, to make it happen. It's just not possible to do everything."
Trying to inspire young athletes, in her cycling programs and in speaking to school children, is an important part of the legacy that Muenzer hopes to leave behind her.
"I think it's important to leave a legacy in a sport and not just to disappear off the face of this planet," she said.
"That is the start of a legacy I would love to leave behind, where you're developing children not only in sport, but off the bike and on the bike."
Muenzer beat women half her age in Athens to become the first Canadian to bring home an Olympic gold in cycling. Long after winning her medal on a warm August night, she walked around the cycling track with a Canadian flag draped over her shoulders, tears streaking her face.
She was named Canada's female athlete of the year by The Canadian Press and Broadcast News, plus was inducted into the Edmonton and Alberta sports halls of fame.
At the 2005 world championships she had a fifth and two seven-place finishes.
Muenzer announced last October she was taking the year off to reflect and regroup. At the time, she didn't rule out competing at the 2008 Olympics in Beijing.
"Taking a break has been awesome," said Muenzer. "It gives you a chance to look at things clear. After the 2005 season it was, `What am I doing, where am I going and how am I doing things?"'<
Over the last year she released a book, "One Gear, No Breaks," and a documentary film on her life following the 2004 Olympics.
Prior to taking the year off Muenzer spent one week a month in Burnaby, B.C., where she could train at a covered velodrome. The travel and time away from home took its toll.
"You have to live in two places," she said. "You need to have your coach follow you. I was training by myself, living by myself."
Also, long-time coach Steen Madsen wanted to spend more time with his family.
"I don't want to work with any other coach," said Muenzer. "We have an amazing friendship. That came into the picture."
She wouldn't rule out returning to competitive cycling, but only with Madsen as her trainer.
"If Steen is willing to coach me and go for another race, another competition, I've always said the sky is the limit," she said.
Muenzer also struggled to find financial support and sponsors. In the end, she decided it was time to shift gears.
"When I was looking at it I (decided) I wanted to start on a new chapter and move toward developing my company."
Jack McCutcheon met Muenzer in 2002, after his wife Brenda Miller was struck and killed by a van as she cycled on a highway between Banff and Jasper.
Miller and Muenzer trained at the same cycling club and McCutcheon started a close friendship with the Olympic cyclist after following his wife's final wishes to make a donation to Muenzer's training efforts.
The public has no idea how much Muenzer has given up in order to win Olympic gold for Canada, McCutcheon said, with a faint glimmer of tears in his eyes.
"She's given up a huge amount in her life," he said. "Career, money, personal relationships, all that sort of thing," he said.
He's happy that his friend can now spend more time just enjoying life.
"We got a chance to go downhill skiing last year and she hadn't done that for 25 years," he said.
"There's so many of those things in life that she just wasn't able to do."
During her career Muenzer won two silver and two bronze world championship medals, 11 World Cup medals, and a silver and bronze medal at the 2002 Commonwealth Games. She also was a 13-time Canadian champion. Muenzer's Olympic journey began as a child, racing her friends on city streets. She was 23 before she decided to seriously take up cycling - borrowing $1,000 to purchase a bicycle - and didn't turn to track racing until five years later.
During her career Muenzer careened over a cliff, broke her collarbone at a race in Cuba and endured tendinitis in her knees.
A compact woman with a bubbling personality, Muenzer is rarely lost for words. But she took a long pause when asked how she wanted to be remembered.
"I think maybe as a person who has defied the odds," she said finally. "The odds of going in an underdog and actually doing it."