meet the family
Meet Sophie
Sophie is a French nomad shaped by movement. She learned to walk on a sailboat crossing the Atlantic and, as a teenager, spent a year circling that ocean by wind alone. Early on, she discovered a world without fixed roots, a mosaic of languages, cultures, and ways of living. After a more linear chapter of studies in Paris and Montreal, the road called her back. She set off in a Renault 4 toward Mongolia, beginning years of slow, deliberate travel. By bicycle, she crossed South and East Africa, Central Asia, and the Sahara, drawn to mountains, deserts, and places where one can disappear. Movement became refuge; the road, a form of peace.
Along the way, Sophie entered the world of bikepacking races, including the Rhino Run, Race Around Rwanda, Badlands and the Atlas Mountain Race - riding not to win, but to endure, to commit, and to explore the limits of body and mind.
Living with an undiagnosed inflammatory condition, she found in cycling a way to keep moving when her body resisted. Racing came with pain, but also clarity: after days on the bike, her symptoms eased, and the real journey often began beyond the finish line. Today, Sophie travels by bike most of the year. She has inverted the calendar, choosing when to stop and work rather than waiting for time off. It is a life of compromises, but one guided by a simple necessity: to remain free.
Sophie Potter
Where do you live: On my bike would be the correct answer. I have no place since 2020. I have a tent, and I leave my extra-stuff at my mum's place and in a garage I am renting.
What do you like to ride most? I love riding a gentle climb on a gravel road, in a stark, mineral landscape, high enough for the light to become almost white - knowing that, at the end, I will begin to descend and probably
look for a river beside which to pitch my tent.
Year of birth: 1991
What’s your day job, and how do you balance that with riding: I amphysio (sometimes) and bikepacker (most of the time). I work few weeks or months per year, it depends, and the rest, I am travelling.
Largest passion except travelling? Creating stories, and history. Telling them, listening to them. I had the opportunity to work as a reporter on the TCR this year for the podcast, and I loved it. It’s something I want to explore further.
Onroad or Offroad? Off-road without any doubt. I don’t like riding with cars and I love remote places. I thrive when things get technical. It amuses me, sharpens my focus, and pulls me fully into the present. It’s a feeling I deeply love.
Flatbar or dropbar? Flat handlebars. They’re far more comfortable for my wrists, more stable when riding fast downhill, and I prefer the feel of brake levers over road-style shifters. They also make it much easier to mount a front bag and build a functional cockpit. I often add aero bars to vary my hand positions and increase comfort on multiple months journey. )
Tent or hotel? Sleeping outside is my absolute pleasure. I use a tent, and sometimes just a mattress and my sleeping bag under a tree. Washing in a river and cooking on a stove are simple, delicious pleasures in my life.
Green or grey? Grey, I’d say. I love mineral, monochrome landscapes - the very particular way sound moves through these environments, and the light. My most beautiful experience was on the Pamir Highway in Tajikistan, at over 4,000 meters of elevation. Everything is dust.
Favourite band: Verdi. I’m not sure he can really be considered a music band though - haha. But I find it incredible that his music was, at the time, a tool of revolution. During the Kromojov race, I had auditory hallucinations, and I kept hearing the Chorus of the Slaves from Nabucco.
Goal in life: Find happiness
Favourite place/moment
“Crossing the southern Namibian desert during the Rhino run. You have to imagine a vast, flat plain ochre sand, yellow grasses. Nothing within a hundred kilometers in any direction. As the sun rose, it turned the grasses into gold. It was magnificent.There was an oryx looking at me. It was hard. The ground was sandy and heavy to ride, but I remember thinking that I was exactly where I wanted to be. It’s a rare feeling, and an incredibly satisfying one."