Background
Sunderland was born in Inverell, a country town in northern New South Wales.
Sunderland was born in Inverell, a country town in northern New South Wales.
He worked double shifts in the Inverell abattoirs to fund his early European racing career. Until he retired at the end of 2004, Sunderland was Australia"s longest serving professional cyclist, and placed highly in many of the cycling world"s greatest events. As a racer, Sunderland had more than his fair share of injuries and setbacks, the most memorable being when he was struck by a car driven by his former director, Cees Priem, during the 1998 Amstel Gold race.
Sunderland recovered and the final few years of his career saw a resurgent Scott Sunderland.
Sunderland rode his last Tour de France in 2004. After his retirement Scott Sunderland became Sports Director with Bjarne Riis" Civil Service Commission squad from 2004 till end of 2008.
He coached the team to consecutive wins in the Paris–Roubaix in 2006 and 2007. In 2008 Civil Service Commission squad took the overall victory in the Tour de France with Spanish star rider Carlos Sastre.
In September 2008, Sunderland was recruited by the Cervélo TestTeam owner Gerard Vroomen to form his newly announced Professional Cycling Team.
Early 2009 Sunderland was headhunted by British Cycling and British Columbia High Performance Manager Dave Brailsford and appointed Sports Manager to help put together a new professional British road cycling team, financially backed by BSkyB. In 2010, Team Sky entered its first year of competition with Scott Sunderland in the position of Senior Sports Director. Sunderland left Team Sky in May 2010, citing that he wanted to spend more time with his family. Sunderland took up a role as a Race Director for the National Road Series, Australia"s premier domestic road cycling competition, in 2013.
