Abdul Sadiq, an Afghanistan's only professional cyclist, began by training his daughter. And when she competed successfully abroad, he set up the team. It is the world's most unlikely sporting team, because the sport breaks taboos in a country where in many traditional communities, women are not allowed out of the house.
The head coach faces frequent threats and the girls' families do not always approve. "If it's not their father trying to stop them, it's a brother or uncle,"
Two members of the team, Massouma, 18, and Zarab, 17, are sisters. Their father and their brothers approve, but Zarab says they know that their uncles complain to their father. "They will never come in front of us to say why are you cycling, but they say bad words to our father," she said. His team have, however, competed and won regionally against Bangladesh and Pakistan.
"We want to go cycling because we want to be heroes one day," said 16-year-old Jella, one of the latest riders. In one of the mildest and driest winters for many years, training has gone on without stopping. And in the spring, the girls will go up into the mountains."We say that women should not sit at home, they need to come out and do sport," said Abdul Sadiq. And 18-year-old Zainab said she wished that she could just go cycling alone on the street one day. "It's my ambition, and I hope that one day girls will be allowed to go cycling on the streets, without a coach, or anyone with them, and they will not have problems," she said.
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