Fahlin takes a break from cycling to recover from head injury

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Emilia Fahlin (FDJ Nouvelle Aquitaine Futuroscope) announced Friday that she will take a break from racing in order to recover from a head injury sustained in a recent training crash. The Swedish national champion was expected to start the upcoming OVO Energy Women's Tour on Monday, June 10, but has pulled out of the race.

"Unfortunately no more race for me in the nicest of jerseys. A high speed crash in training with a resulted head injury have forced me to take some time off and not yet able to plan when I'll be back in competition," Fahlin wrote in a post on Twitter.

"But thankful of the support from @FDJ_NAqui_Fut to make a full and good recovery! Quite the blow to miss some of the races I'd looked forward to the most.. But I'm sure I'll get reasons to smile following them racing the next weeks."

Fahlin began racing in 2007 as a professional with the T-Mobile women's team. She spent six years with that programme, during it's changes in title sponsors Team Columbia Women, HTC-Highroad Women and Specialized-Lululemon. In 2013, she joined Hitec Products before spending two years with Wiggle Honda in 2014 and 2015. She then spent one season with Ale Cipollini (2016) before returning to Wiggle for another two seasons (2017 and 2018).

Fahlin is a three-time national champion of Sweden winning the road race titles in 2008, 2013 and most recently last year. She has also won three national time trial titles from 2009-2011. Her other career achievements include winning stages of the Tour de l'Ardeche, Gracia Orlova, and she won the Crescent Vårgårda Women's World Cup. She was ninth at the World Championships in Bergen in 2017 and finished a career-best fourth at the World Championships in Innsbruck last year.

She signed a one-year contract to race with the French team FDJ Nouvelle Aquitaine Futuroscope for the 2019 season. She has had top-10 performances at Trofeo Alfredo Binda, Driedaagse Brugge-De Panne, stages at the Tour de Yorkshire and Festival Elsy Jacobs.

Fahlin was registered to race with her team at the OVO Energy Women's Tour. FDJ Nouvelle Aquitaine Futuroscope confirmed that she would not be competing in a post on social media that read, "Following a fall, @EmiliaFahlin will not be at the start of the @thewomenstour in order to recover well for the next races."