ROSIE Brown told of her joy at winning the Cycling National MTB Expert Series, despite only getting in the saddle in January 2015.

Brown managed to clinch the title after finishing more than three minutes ahead of her race and series rivals.

“My race wasn’t until 1pm, then I went to get warmed up. I knew I could win from the race field but anything can happen in a mountain bike race,” said the 24-year-old.

“I just went into it thinking: 'if you finish in the top three, you are going to get a place. If you finish any worse than that, you won’t'. I didn’t know I could actually win it. “Once I went in front of the girl in second, I made a conscious effort to push on. Every time I looked, she was further away but I could still see her.

“On my final lap, I thought: 'I’ve got to give it everything'. I came past my dad at the finish and they said I’d taken the race and series win. It was a bit emotional but I was over the moon.

“It was brilliant. After you’ve only been riding since January 2015, to win the series is pretty amazing, really."

After winning the expert category, Brown can now step up to the highest category and race in the Elite section.

“Next year, I am going into the elite. I’m hoping to get at least one top-10 finish in the elite next year but the girls are so strong,” she added.

“I just have to keep training hard over the winter and just see what happens. I’m really excited. I think it will be a massive step for me.

“A lot of the riders I’ll be riding against have been riding for a good amount of years and I haven’t been riding for that long.”