Kelly Catlin, a member of the U.S. womens pursuit cycling team that won a silver at the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, died last week at age 23.
Caitlin's brother Colin (they're triplets, along with sister Christine) confirmed that his sister's death was by suicide in a Facebook post. "She's the one person I had shared almost my entire life with, and I shall miss her terribly," he wrote.
There isnt a minute that goes by that we dont think of her and think of the wonderful life she could have lived, her father, Mark Catlin told VeloNews . There isnt a second in which we wouldnt freely give our lives in exchange for hers. The hurt is unbelievable.
Catlin, who was also pursuing a graduate degree in Computational Mathematics at Stanford, earned three consecutive world championship titles with the U.S. womens pursuit team from 2016-2018. She also raced with the Rally UHC Pro Cycling Team on the road. Catlin
recently wrote a journal on velonews.com
about how she balanced her cycling and personal goals, which she said was "like juggling with knives."
Catlin's sister Christine, told the Washington Post that Kelly was "a really special person-kind, funny, empathetic, and talented at literally everything she did. She just felt like she couldnt say no to everything that was asked of her and this was her only escape.
She also said that her sister started struggling with her mental health last year, after a cycling crash where she broke her arm and suffered a concussion. She couldnt train as well as she used to, Christine Catlin told the Post . She had really bad headaches and was sensitive to light. Then she tried to commit suicide in January the same way. We called police the moment we got the email and they got there in time to save her that time.
"Our thoughts and prayers are with the Catlin family," USA Cycling President Rob DeMartini said in a statement . "Kelly was more than an athlete to us, and she will always be part of the USA Cycling family."