Dame Laura Kenny expecting second child after year of heartbreak

Five-time Olympic champion Dame Laura Kenny has announced that she and husband Sir Jason Kenny are expecting their second child.

The news comes a year after Kenny, 30, suffered an ectopic pregnancy and 14 months after she suffered a miscarriage.

Kenny, who gave birth to son Albie in August 2017, announced the news via her Instagram page.

“A year ago today I was sat in A&E knowing I was really poorly but not knowing what was wrong with me,” Kenny wrote.

“When I got the news I was having an ectopic pregnancy my world felt like it crumbled. We had already lost our second baby in November and I remember lying there searching for some sort of answers.

“I still feel this heartbreak today and I don’t think it will ever go away. But today a year on…”

Kenny then posted a picture of four bikes leaning against a fence to signal the expected addition to the family.

She added: “Today I felt like I couldn’t hide away anymore. I’m already starting to show and the anxiety I have felt has been unreal. Telling the world means I have to accept we are having another baby and this fills me with all kinds of emotions.

“But I also know there are going to be so many people, like I was, seeing my post and wishing I would go away with my happy ending.

“But I also know, when I was lying in the hospital bed, I was searching for people’s happy endings because it was the only thing giving me any comfort at the time. That maybe, just maybe I would get my happy ending.”

Kenny, Britain’s most successful female Olympian, revealed both the miscarriage and ectopic pregnancy in April last year. Kenny had a fallopian tube removed during emergency surgery, and said “scared doesn’t even come close” and “sometimes life pushes you to an unbearable limit”.

Wednesday’s announcement comes 18 months before the 2024 Olympics get under way in Paris on July 26.

Kenny would still have a window to return to racing before then if she chooses to do so, but would have limited opportunity to actually compete before the start of the Games due to recent changes in the calendar which have moved the World Championships to a slot later in the year.

At the same Games Kenny won silver in the team pursuit – an event in which team-mate Elinor Barker rode in the first round not realising she was pregnant at the time.

Kenny previously won gold in both the omnium and team pursuit at the 2012 and 2016 Olympics, and is the only British woman to have won gold at three consecutive Games.

Husband Jason won his seventh gold medal in Tokyo with a stunning victory in the keirin final. The following January, he announced his retirement from racing in order to become coach of Great Britain’s men’s sprint team.