Cycling New Zealand admits they should've shown "more empathy" and could've done more to prevent Olivia Podmore's death.
A second inquiry into Cycling New Zealand in just four years was released on Monday, following the death of up-and-coming track cycling star Olivia Podmore last year.
Cycling NZ chair Phil Holden told Newshub Live at 8pm on Monday, that the report has highlighted they didn't do enough to help Podmore during the tough times.
"We could've done better, we should've done better, the inquiry report was extremely hard-hitting in that and we have a platform to move forward from," Holden told Newshub at 8pm's Rebecca Wright.
"There is no doubt, the environment from 2016-2018, which Olivia was clearly a key part was not a great place to be.
"There was severe grief and trauma from former athletes that were around at that time and support staff that we need to address and obviously Olivia was a part of that."
Holden said Cycling NZ should've shown more "empathy" to athletes during the period Podmore was in their environment.
"I think perhaps the detail around more holistic support for Olivia, more holistic support for those cyclists around at that time, I think closing the loop in terms of perhaps some of the communication and just showing a little bit more empathy is how I would put it," Holden said.
"You will recall this afternoon [Monday], the two keywords I said were trust and confidence and I think people and athletes at that time had little trust and confidence in Cycling NZ and that is an issue we have to front up to and we will."
Holden hopes athletes that are still feeling grief in their environment have the confidence to come forward and work with them.
"We are really open to what that process might look like so we can help those people who are still feeling that deep grief and sense of loss and trauma from that time and to get some closure and perhaps move forward with their lives," he said.
"I would really like those people who are still feeling that deep sense of grief to trust us to come forward and perhaps together and we can look at what that might look like."
Holden told Newshub he believes the way forward for Cycling NZ is to focus on the athletes as people, not results.
"My personal view is that if we have great people who happen to be athletes then they'll be great athletes," he told Newshub.
"In order to make them feel like they're great people, they got to have a spiritual and emotional connection, they have to be very well supported and they have to have deep trust from either the people they are getting advice from or coaching from in order for them to be at their best and deliver their best.
"If any of those things are missing, I guess on the lefthand side of the brain, then it makes it very, very difficult to deliver a high performance, performance in quite a pressure-cooker environment."
Watch the full interview with phil Holden above.
