He was in the four-man New Zealand team who lost to Denmark in the team pursuit bronze medal ride, a year after winning gold at the world champs in France in the same event.
"The Olympics is the Olympics, it’s the pinnacle of sport in terms of cycling," he says.
The 31-year-old says the Olympics had been a goal since he was a kid.
"To get there was a huge road of ups and downs, heartache, excitement, all of it, and then to get there and arrive in that village and be welcomed by the Kiwis is just incredible."
Bulling retired from the sport at 24, just over a year later, once he’d been offered a job at Queenstown’s Shotover Jet after a driver left.
"[This job] comes with its own pressure and adrenalin and risk," he says.
About 18 months after retiring he says he got the ‘Olympic blues’ — "moments when you thought you should have carried on".
Bulling took a digger driver’s job during Covid but afterwards went back behind the wheel and has now logged over 4000 trips. As senior driver he’s also trained a lot of drivers.
Bulling says he’ll take a huge interest in the cycling events at the Paris Olympics.
Down the track, he believes Queenstown could do with a cycling velodrome.
"Who doesn’t want to come here for training?"
