'I was always going to be that young girl to them' – Niamh Fisher-Black's clean slate for growth at Lidl-Trek

Niamh Fisher-Black was just 20 when she joined the world’s top team, a squad full of big names, big ambitions and also plenty of the best in the world to learn from.

Though, after four seasons with SD Worx-Protime the rider from New Zealand is chasing something different, and decided the best place to do it was in the fresh pastures of Lidl-Trek.

There was no vitriol amid her departure. In fact, there was plenty of gratitude, the shift was more a recognition that sometimes the fuel that growth requires is change.

“I'm really motivated to see what the potential is there,” Fisher-Black told Cyclingnews in Adelaide, sitting outside and taking in the fresh air of a hot evening as she spoke.

“I think it's difficult to become a GC rider, I still need to grow a lot and there are a lot of things I need to work on, and it takes a lot of support and not just, expecting to be given that support, but also learning to demand that support.

“Also learning to be a leader and that's, I think, what a lot of really good cyclists or athletes, forget – that this is a team sport. And firstly, I need to grow as a person, and that's my next step, get to know this team and see if maybe I could go into that role.

"With a fresh start, a clean slate, it's a really nice way for me to make that step. I mean I joined SD Worx as a young girl and I think I was always going to be that young girl to them. A new environment maybe gives me a new opportunity to step outside of that box.”

Looking back over Fisher-Black’s time with SD Worx-Protime it was certainly a big jump for the young rider from Nelson on New Zealand’s south island to sign with the powerhouse squad of women’s cycling.

That came after having a month racing with UCI team Bigla in 2019 and then dipping back to the Continental ranks in 2020 with Équipe Paule Ka for a season where, on top of the COVID-19 interruptions, the team folded before the end of the year due to a lack of funding.

Fisher-Black said she had at times wondered how she would have developed had she at that point ended up somewhere other than SD Worx-Protime but quickly dismisses any notion that being on the team heavy on big names, like Demi Vollering and Lotte Kopecky, held her back. 

“I say it over and over, I don't think that I ever didn't get opportunity on SD Worx, and at the end of the day, if you want to be at the top of the sport, it's not about what opportunities you're given, you have to show that you're good enough,” said Fisher-Black.

“I was amongst some of the best riders in the world, and if I wanted to be at the top of the world and be at the pointy end of the races, I had to be as good as them, if not better.”

“It was a challenge that motivated me and plenty of opportunities came for me along the way – I got breakaways and I remember wearing countless leaders jerseys in the first years. I don't think anything was ever taken away from me but maybe that's just my personality, being around successful people lifted me up as well.”

Why Lidl-Trek?

Fisher-Black had considerable success in her time at SD-Worx ProTime, topping the Women’s WorldTour youth classification in 2021, claiming the first women’s U23 world title in 2022, and winning stage 4 of the Tour de Suisse to deliver her first Women’s WorldTour victory in 2023.

In 2024 she took to her first GC podium with third at Setmana Valenciana, and also delivered fourth overall at the Tour de Romandie, before racing her first Tour de France Femmes, where she captured 14th overall even while working for team leader Vollering.

It’s a set of results that was bound to have left her with many options, though it seems there was never really any other for Fisher-Black than the team that was her old squad’s biggest rival, Lidl-Trek. That’s why when the opportunity with Lidl-Trek came up, for the first time, she considered it and “imagined myself somewhere else”.

“I've been in this scene and raced against this team for four years. You get to know the riders in the peloton, and you see how the team races,” said Fisher-Black, explaining the draw of the team she has committed to through the end of 2027.

“It was sitting down with the management team and Ina herself and just having a conversation and I think that's enough. You can gauge what the team's intentions are and they believed in me and that was motivating.”

The change of path for Fisher-Black also mirrored a similar move by her younger brother Finn, who this year also made the shift from the world’s top squad UAE Team Emirates to Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe and was also in Adelaide racing the Tour Down Under with his new squad in January, coming over after the pair both spent Christmas at home.

“Probably, when we were both going through these decisions last year, we talked each other through it and helped each other through it. Definitely my brother helped me, because change is a really scary prospect,” said Fisher-Black.

“We're both on very, very nice teams but it's also just as much a new opportunity and a new career direction for him as it is for me. It's cool that we can do it like at the same time and hopefully help each other as there's some lows, because change is a really, really hard and changing teams changes a lot.”

Shuffling the deck

Lidl-Trek certainly have a history of having powerful riders to chase results. However, it too has been part of one almighty shuffling of the decks in 2025, which has included a move by Demi Vollering to FDJ–Suez from SD Worx-Protime and Elisa Longo Borghini, who had been part of the Lidl-Trek squad since its formation in 2019, moving on to UAE Team ADQ.

That has left a developing Gaia Realini, as a key general classification leader for the team and while Fisher-Black may also be coming in to bolster the potential options and support so is Riejanne Markus, who came second overall at La Vuelta Femenina in 2024, and Anna Henderson and Emma Norsgaard are also new riders for the squad.

The shift of key figures from both the world’s top teams is set to alter the dynamic dramatically in a sport that has already been changing at a rate of knots in recent years and Fisher-Black, for one is clearly invigorated by the new order. 

“This distribution of really great riders is more spread out, and I think it's really exciting,” said Fisher-Black, her face lighting up as she contemplated the prospect. “I think that the racing will be different. It will feel different. There will be different teams on top, and different riders on top. 

“That excites me because it's going to be a challenge to start to understand new ways of racing and new people to look for because every year we see also new talent come through. And even just in the last year, women's cycling has lifted so much that I will not be surprised to see more and more that this margin of difference at the top is so small.” 

As the sport continues to change and elevate its game each season, that is just what Fisher-Black aims to do as well.

"Every year I just want to get better and this team has this direction and I can tell being with them, that just, everything is about improving,” said Fisher-Black. “There's always a way to get better and that's for me is really motivating and that's also why we see our sport going so much faster and and the level lifting higher and higher.

“Lidl-Trek have given me a really great opportunity with three years and I hope to pay it back. That means winning some races and hopefully stepping up to be a GC rider for them, and also supporting their other GC riders and really playing with Gaia Realini. I really look forward to that.”