Late September is early spring in Sydney, Australia, and visitors are likely to find the weather chilly and wet. If you go to Sydney to watch the 2000 Olympics, that means packing a raincoat. If you go there to compete, it could mean adjusting your strategy to account for less-than-ideal conditions. For example, if you were racing cyclist Deirdre Murphy ’80, you would have to think about fog, mist, and slippery pavement along the 80-mile road course.

If you really were Deirdre Murphy, you’d be delighted just to be there, of course; but you would also aim for the head of the pack, your unwavering eyes on the prize: an Olympic medal.

Competing in the Olympics is every sports enthusiast’s impossible dream, and most of us recognize it as such. Gaining a spot on an Olympic team when you are already on the mature side of 40 means beating astronomical odds. Going to the Olympics at 41, with only eight years’ experience in your sport, is a long shot that would make the most reckless gambler hesitate.

But doing the unexpected is a lifelong habit for Murphy. As a student at Ithaca College, she raced her BMW 2002 in Sports Car Club of America rallies. A dislocated knee the morning of tryouts kept her off the gymnastics team, so she joined the Ultimate Frisbee team and took a scuba diving class that culminated in an early-morning dive into Cayuga Lake — in December. A general studies major with an interest in Japanese and photography, Murphy turned her attention to computer science after a class that she had joined "grudgingly" at the behest of her parents turned out to be a lot more interesting than she’d expected. And now, after spending 17 years on Wall Street as a securities trader, she is a self-employed interior designer — and a full-time racing cyclist.