NEAH Evans is a woman going places fast. In less than three years, she has made the leap from hobby cyclist to collecting medals and big-name scalps with impressive aplomb.

The 26-year-old from Aberdeen rubber-stamped her arrival in the cycling world last year with her first set of British national stripes and a clutch of Scottish titles across road and track.

A succession of strong performances at the 2016 Revolution Series UK Championship during the autumn was followed by a head-to-head thriller with compatriot Katie Archibald at Six Day London. Archibald took the win, Evans earning a hard-fought second place.

Yet, it was in the omnium at the Revolution Champions League that Evans really began to make people sit up and take notice. She claimed back-to-back wins in Manchester and London, holding off the challenge from four-time Olympic champion Laura Kenny in the latter to seize victory.

Given the illustrious company she has been keeping of late, the Glasgow-based veterinary surgeon would be forgiven for developing a serious swagger.

Yet, as Evans reflects on her achievements there is not even the slightest hint of hyperbole.

"I was pleasantly surprised," she says. "You train hard and hope the results will come through but it always depends on the day how everyone else is going."

She began cycling in 2013 while recovering from an injury sustained in her first love of hill running. Having dabbled initially on the road during Sunday club runs with Glasgow Wheelers, her first spin around a velodrome in early 2014 had Evans hooked.

Before long she was a regular at the Scottish National Track League and won a quintet of medals at the British Universities and Colleges Sport Track Championships that year.

Evans caught the eye of sprint coach Kevin Stewart who invited her along to some training sessions. She joined the Scottish Cycling Performance Programme in 2015 and after first honing her skills as a sprinter, switched to the endurance side of the sport.

"I come from a running background and knew I had more natural ability in endurance, but the type of training required was just too difficult to fit in around a full-time job. Sprint is much more technical-based and being new to cycling that helped with learning how to race and ride a bike.

"It has all happened fairly fast. I made the change from sprint to endurance but the big transition came last March when I started working part-time."

Evans, a qualified vet who works with small animals, decided to cut back her hours in a bid to maximise her cycling potential.

"I was making good progress but the limiting factor was that there wasn't enough time in the day to work, train and get the recovery I needed," she says. "I'm still limited in how well I recover because of work.

"I can stand for 10 hours a day quite easily which isn't great preparation to train or race the next day. I'm also still on call one night a week. Sometimes I'm lucky and it's quiet, but other times I'm up and out during the night which is not conducive to good training."

She is based at the Sir Chris Hoy Velodrome in Glasgow where recent months have been spent training alongside Olympic team pursuit champion and Sunday Herald columnist Archibald.

"It is always great fun racing Katie," says Evans. "We are good friends off the bike, but when we are racing it is very much to beat each other."

Evans will compete at the 2017 HSBC UK National Track Championships in Manchester next weekend. With the Team Scotland selection period for the Gold Coast 2018 Commonwealth Games now open, there is more than just medals at stake.

"I had a good run of results in the Revolution Series so I'm looking to do well at the national championships but it is difficult because you don't know what everyone else has been doing leading up to it," she says.

"I would like to get some good results, but for me it is about gaining experience and learning how to race tactically well rather than relying on other people's mistakes to get the results."

After a big block of racing in the autumn and early winter, her goal over Christmas and New Year was to build fitness and strength in the lead-up to the track nationals.

Preparations haven't gone exactly to plan with a recent chest infection disrupting training. Evans, though, remains philosophical.

"That's just the way things go," she says. "It has taken me a bit longer than I hoped to get back to full training."

Her star may be in the ascendant, yet any probing questions about future lofty aspirations – Olympics, worlds and Europeans – are neatly deflected.

"At the moment I'm doing well, but I still have a huge amount to improve," she asserts. "I'm not going to put any limitations on it. I'm just going to keep working hard and see where I end up."

Read more: Scots to watch at the 2017 HSBC UK National Track Championships