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Bessette has won every 'cross race she's entered.

Grande was second for the second straight day.

Vervecken leads Johnson over a pair of barriers.

Feel the love: Teamwork earned the Trek crew the win in the desert.

There have been some most unusual numerical coincidences at the 2001 world road championships here in Lisbon, Portugal, this week. Of the five time trials contested on the first three days, four of the eventual winners were fourth fastest at the first time split. The exception was elite women's winner Jeannie Longo, who was second at that first time check. The road races started in similar vein on Friday: Both of the races ended in solo winners who finished exactly 17 seconds ahead of the runner-up. Could this trend continue through the final three races of the weekend? That might be too

After losing the junior men's time trial by 44 hundredths of a second last Wednesday, 18-year-old Oleksandr Kvachuk from Ukraine was in tears. So close, but so far. On Saturday, Kvachuk put that disappointment behind him and made a blistering solo break, to win the 121km road race by 1:07 over a chase group of four that was brought home by Dutchman Niels Scheuneman — whose silver medal joins the bronze he scored in the time trial. Commenting on his win, Kvachuk said, "After the time trial I was sad -- so today I decided to show that I am a real champion." He proved that with an astonishing

In a long career at the elite level Lithuanian twin Rasa Polikeviciute has almost won a host of big races -- a time-trial bronze medal at last year's world's, second at the women's Tour de France in 1994 and ’96, a silver medal in the road race at the 1996 world's, and third overall at this year's Hewlett-Packard Challenge and the Tour of Tuscany. Finally, on Saturday afternoon, the 31-year-old sprinted to her own rainbow jersey in an ultimately exciting elite women's 121km road race. Polikeviciute knew she was in good form -- fourth in the time trial on Wednesday -- but as she said: "In the

For the past eight years, the Italian national pro men's road squad has been the team to beat at the world's. And each time, the team has been beaten. The closest the famous azzuri have come to taking the supreme rainbow jersey was a silver medal by the now-retired Claudio Chiappucci in 1994. Two others have won bronze medals: Marco Pantani in 1995 and Michele Bartoli in 1996 and ’98. Bartoli is back as one of the Italian team's leaders, and his recent transfer to the Fassa Bortolo trade team should bring some focus to his newest assault on the title. That's because Fassa Bortolo also has

Trek-Volkswagen took the most dramatic win of the day, but when the dust settled in Moab, there were hundreds of other images and stories to be shared among the finishers. Here are a few:

One has nearly a lifetime’s worth of experience. The other was riding in the second cyclo-cross race her career. Still, the results were the same, as reigning world champion Erwin Vervecken and ‘cross newby Lyne Bessette walked away with wins at the opening round of the SuperCup series on a foggy Saturday afternoon in Gloucester, Massachusetts.

Longo leads the escape

Rock, paper, scissors: The common method to decide who starts.

Vervecken was smooth over the barriers.

Bessette was good enough on the run-ups.

Johnson goes up and over.

Vervecken leads the early break through the sand pit.

Grande makes her way through the sand.

Gloucester provided a picturesque setting for 'cross.

Team Beaver Creek makes a transition in an early night lap.

Campfire tales: Subaru-Gary Fisher brought the big rig.

Into the night: That's when things get interesting.

Dualies: Two lights are better than one.

Fans

Men's solo winner Grewal heads out for his 17th and final lap.

Group hug: Trek-VW won by just two minutes.

What it's really all about

What me worry? Gretchen Reeves moments before the final showdown with Alison Sydor

As night fell on Lisbon Thursday, workers at the world cycling championship venue in Monsanto Park were busy changing its configuration from an intricate time-trial course of 19.5km to a more straightforward road-race circuit of 12.1km. The final five events all use the same circuit, starting Friday morning with the shortest (six laps totaling 72.6km for junior women) and closing on Sunday with the longest (21 laps totaling 254.1km for elite men). Heading in a clockwise direction, the peloton rides on a flat smooth highway to reach the first climb after 1.2km. In two parts, this hill has an

After taking her second rainbow jersey of the week, and her fourth world title in 12 months, Nicole Cooke said something quite insightful about the key to her amazing success. The defending junior women's road race champion was asked if she had an idol. After thinking for a few seconds, she replied, "Not really.... I set my own targets rather than following the lead of others." And that's exactly what the 18-year-old Brit did in the six-lap, 72.6km race on Friday morning. After the 64 starters rode as a pack for two easy laps, they reached the start of the main climb on lap 3. Feeling

He's only 21, but Yaroslav Popovich from Ukraine already seems like a seasoned veteran. And he should fit right into the pro peloton when he joins the Domo team next year. One quality that will stand him in good stead in the paid ranks is his ability to overcome the pressure of expectation. He was expected to win Friday's grueling under-23 road race -- and he did. A year ago, he came up short by three seconds at the world's, beaten into second place by the young Russian Evgeni Petrov. And if Popovich hadn't had to race the final lap-and-a-half stuck in the 53 chainring after his front

Results from day 4 of the world master's track championships in Manchester, England. Click on "View race results."

Professional cyclists will be guaranteed an annual minimum wage for the first time after an accord was signed in Lisbon, Portugal Friday between the professional cyclists association (CPA) and the AIGCP, which represents professional cycling teams. The accord was signed at the world road race championships between CPA chief Francesco Moser and Manolo Saiz, who runs the Spanish ONCE team and who is also head of the AIGCP. "We've managed to come to an agreement which allows for identical rules for each country," former professional Moser said after the meeting. "Riders now have much

Familiar territory for Cooke

It all came down to Wloszczowska, Cooke and Möhlmann

Cooke makes her move

Pate was a threat

With 6.2km remaining of Thursday's elite men's time trial, at the high point of the Lisbon course, 770 feet above sea level, it looked as though the race was over. Leading the 38.7km world championship by seven seconds over Colombia's Santiago Botero was Britain's David Millar, while prerace favorite Jan Ullrich seemed to be fighting a losing battle in third place, 10 seconds back. All that remained was a steep descent, a short uphill and a fast downhill to a tail-wind run to the finish, 500 feet below. And when Millar crossed the line to improve Botero's earlier best time of 52:01 by five

Les Earnest may have triumphed in the courts, but he lost big at the ballot box as the reform initiative he championed was defeated by a margin of nearly 14-1 during the 2001 USA Cycling member elections. Proposition A, which was supported by San Francisco investment banker Thomas Weisel, Lance Armstrong, the USA Cycling Development Foundation and others, garnered 6007 "yes" votes, easily defeating Earnest's Proposition B, which drew only 432 positive votes. Indeed, Proposition B didn't even fare as well as a couple other major reform and legislative measures on the ballot, including

The world masters track championships continue this week in Manchester, England. The U.S. continued its strong performance, with American riders picking up five more gold medals on day 3. For results from day 3, click on "View race results."

Leipheimer

Millar

In what was probably the closest finish in any world time trial championship, only 78 hundredths of a second covered the first three finishers in Wednesday morning's junior men's event. The one who came up lucky in the 19.2km time trial was Jurgen Van den Broeck, a pale-faced, crewcut, 18-year-old who bec ame the first Belgian to win any sort of medal at a world's time trial. He beat runner-up Oleksandr Kvachuk from Ukraine by less than half-a-second, while Dutchman Niels Scheuneman took the bronze medal.

Even Jeannie Longo herself said it! "This title was more emotional than the others ... the crowning of my career,” said the veteran French phenom after taking the 13th world championship in her illustrious career. Why so emotional? "Well, you know my age," added Longo, who will be 43 on October 31. It was also emotional for the manner in which she snatched the elite women's time-trial by four-tenths of a second over the startling Swiss racer Nicole Brändli -- who was just six years old when Longo won her first rainbow jersey 16 years ago! Brändli set out like a rocket on the 19.2km course

The U.S. took home five gold medals in the opening two days of competition at the world masters track championships in Manchester, England. On the men’s side, Keith Harrison (60-64) and Stan Gregg (55-59) won their respective 500-meter time trials, while Alphonso Whaley took gold in the 40-44 750-meter time trial. On the women’s side, Linelle Betts (45-49) and Suzie Tignor (35-39) won their 500-meter time trials. For results from Manchester, click on "View Race Results."

Lance Armstrong would have loved racing on the world time trial championship course here in Lisbon. It's a course that favors strong riders who, like Wednesday's winners Jeannie Longo and Jurgen Van den Broeck, also know how to climb. In Longo's assessment, it is the most difficult world's TT course since the hilly, point-to-point, into-the-head-wind affair at Tunja, Colombia, in 1995. Yes, Armstrong would have loved the 40 turns, 10 climbs and descents, and the 2450 feet of climbing that the 53 elite men will tackle in 38.7km of racing (over two laps) on Thursday. But the Texan hung up his

Frenchman Arnaud Tournant shattered his own world record for the kilometer on Wednesday morning, becoming the first cyclist to go under the one-minute mark for the distance. Tournant was one of three French riders making record attempts on Wednesday at the velodrome in La Paz, Bolivia, at an altitude of over 11,000 feet. Tournant turned in a time of 58.875 seconds, an average speed of 61.146kph (37.9mph). "Right now, I can’t believe it," said Tournant, originally from Roubaix in northern France. "I simply wanted to go under a minute. A time of 59.99 would have sufficed." Tournant beat his

Van den Broeck

A year ago in the road world’s at Plouay. France, the petite but powerful Nicole Cooke gave Britain a startling gold medal in the junior women’s road race. She expected to win, and in her press conference said that she was very upset that she hadn’t been allowed to ride at the Sydney Olympics -– she was too young. Cooke was clearly a young woman who knew what she wanted and seemed determined to go places. This year, her rabid ambition took her to the world junior women’s cross-country title at Vail a few weeks ago, and on Tuesday morning in Lisbon, Portugal, she added a third rainbow jersey

American Danny Pate won the men's under-23 world championship time-trial in Lisbon, Portugal Tuesday. Pate was an easy winner posting a time 38 seconds faster than silver medallist Sebastian Lang of Germany, while South Africa's James Perry was just one-third a second slower than Lang. Pate later said he’d had difficulty setting aside thoughts of the tragic events of September 11 as he prepared for the world championships.

On Tuesday the UCI made official what was rumored for much of the 2001 mountain biking season: dual is done. In it’s place for 2002 will be the 4-up format, which was seen at this year’s Sea Otter Classic and the NORBA finals in Vermont, and will now be a World Cup and world championship discipline. The UCI announcement was accompanied by the 2002 World Cup schedule, which sees the series shrink from eight to six races. Also of note is the absence of a stop in the United States. It will be the first time in 12-year history of the series that the World Cup won’t be coming to America. However,

Since the individual time trial first became a world championship event in 1994, there has rarely been a course quite as technical and challenging as the one laid out around the vast forested Monsanto Park in central Lisbon, Portugal. On Tuesday, opening day of the 2001 road world's, abbreviated versions of the course produced resounding victories for American Danny Pate in the under-23 category and Britain's Nicole Cooke in the junior women's division. On Wednesday, junior men and elite women will both compete over one lap of the full 19.2km time-trial course -- which is based on the main

Hammer's 19:24.27 was good enough for 12th

Pate wins world U23 TT title

The National Racing Calendar is drawing to a close, with the final weeks of racing hitting the south and southeast regions of the country. This past weekend saw a pair of NRC events, the Mercy Celebrity Classic in Fort Smith, Arkansas, and the CycleFest 2001 in West Palm Beach, Florida. At the Mercy Celebrity Classic, Chris Horner (Prime Alliance) and Rachel Purvis (Athlete’s by Design) took the men’s and women’s races respectively. In West Palm Beach, Ivan Dominguez (Saturn) and Rebecca McClintock (jane Cosmetics) took the wins in the NRC event on Sunday. Sunday’s Bill Bone Grand Prix NRC

The results are in… sort of. Following USA Cycling’s annual membership meeting in Colorado Springs, Colorado on Saturday officials were able to announce that voter participation reached a record high. Impressive as that sounds, it really means that for the first time since USA Cycling was incorporated in 1995 at least 10 percent of licensees cast their votes on ballots that included candidates and an array of issues regarding the future governance of the organization. Election results, however, will not be issued until Wednesday, October 10. According to a press release from USA Cycling, the

It wasn’t the expected sprinter who won the 95th Paris-Tours in France on Sunday, it was a climber. And it wasn’t just any climber, it was Frenchman Richard Virenque, who pulled off a major personal coup in winning the second-to-last race of the 2001 UCI World Cup series. Virenque, formerly of Festina and now riding for Domo-Farm Frites, just returned to competitive racing in August after serving a lengthy suspension from the sport after the Festina doping scandal of 1998. Spaniard Oscar Freire (Mapei-Quick Step) finished second in Sunday’s 254.5km race in France, and German sprinting ace

Hands up: Virenque bagged his biggest win since he was banned for doping.

Long way to go: Durand and Virenque made their move just 12km into the race.

USA Cycling has released selection criteria for riders hoping to qualify for the 2002 World Cyclo-cross Championships in Zolder, Belgium on February 2-3, 2002. The detailed document was released after receiving approval from USA Cycling's selection committee on Friday. Team selection procedures rely heavily on the accumulation of UCI points, which are awarded at cyclo-cross holding a UCI sanction. There are several UCI Category 2 and 3 races in the U.S. this season, though most are concentrated in the Eastern portion of the U.S., though promoters have recently added at least one UCI

Telekom’s Jan Ullrich is facing questioning by Florence magistrate Luigi Bocciolini in his inquiry into the raid by anti-doping police on June 6 at San Remo during the Giro d'Italia, European wire services reported Friday. In all 20 non-Italian riders will be questioned but former Tour de France winner Ullrich is by far the biggest name among them. It is expected that he will be quizzed by Bocciolini some time after the World Cycling championships in Lisbon - the road race is on October 14. Ullrich, who participated in the Tour of Lucca that ended on Friday, was visited on Wednesday

A trio of one-day classics in Italy last weekend gave a late indication on how the world road championship will play out on October 14 in Lisbon. First, Russian champion Dmitri Konyshev, 35, led home a five-man breakaway in the uphill finish to a fast, tough Coppa Sabatini. Then, in the very hilly Tour of Emilia, Olympic and German champion Jan Ullrich broke clear with Italian standouts Davide Rebellin and Francesco Casagrande — and then outsprinted them for the win. And finally Belgium's 38-year-old Andreï Tchmil joined a late attack, jumped away from them with a kilometer to go, and held

The Univest Grand Prix, the premier amateur-only event in the United States, was officially canceled a week after the September 11 terrorist attacks in the U.S. The event organizers had originally announced that the Pennsylvania race had been postponed until October, but the event was finally called off on September 19. "The Univest Grand Prix is above all an international event. We feel it unwise to expose our athletes to risk in these uncertain times," said John Eustice of Sparta Cycling, the race organizer. "After a period of reflection, we will resume our work and build the 2002 Univest

Team Mercury's season came to an end on Monday, when it was announced that the UCI has suspended the team for failing to meet financial obligations. After co-sponsor Viatel went bankrupt in the middle of the season, Mercury was left short on funds, and eventually had to draw on the escrow account required by the UCI. Once the team began to draw on those funds, it had 30 days to replenish the account, which must contain an amount equal to three months of staff and rider salaries. When the team failed to do so, it was suspended beginning October 1. "We actually knew it was coming. My

The end-of-season transfer announcements have picked up in recent days, and a couple of big names were in the news on Tuesday: Johan Museeuw and Frank Vandenbroucke. Museeuw was reportedly close to signing a one-year deal with Mapei, his team of five years before he joined the Domo team for the 2001 season. Looking to replace Museeuw, Domo team manager Patrick Lefevre has offered a contract to the talented but troubled Frank Vandenbroucke, who was let go by his Lampre team a few weeks ago. Meanwhile, the CSC-Tiscali team had actual signings to announce this week. The team added Spaniard

With his three stage victories at the beginning of the Vuelta a España, Telekom’s Erik Zabel accrued enough UCI points to move him to the top of the UCI road rankings, displacing former No. 1 Lance Armstrong (U.S. Postal Service), who dropped to fourth. Davide Rebellin (Liquigas-Pata) moved into second place, with fellow Italian Francesco Casagrande (Fassa Bortolo) third. Several other riders used the Vuelta to propel themselves upward in the UCI standings, including Oscar Sevilla (Kelme-Costa Blanca), who lost the race on the final day but moved from 30th to sixth in the UCI standings. The

Navigators' Vasilli Davidenko, the winner of the BMC Software series, has been suspended by the Russian Cycling Federation for two months following the final adjudication of a positive drug test reported April 7 after a BMC race in Austin, Texas. USA Cycling chief operating officer Steve Johnson confirmed Tuesday that Davidenko had tested positive for nandrolone (19-norandrosterone and 19-noretiocholanolone) at the BMC criterium. The Russian Federation formally suspended Davidenko for two months on September 17. Johnson said the UCI reported the positive to USA Cycling following the

In a written statement issued on Tuesday, the Navigators cycling team addressed the suspension of team rider Vassili Davidenko for a positive drug test dating back to April 7. According to the release, the team believes that the positive test was the result of an "over-the-counter herbal food supplement that did not have a full accounting of the ingredients on the label." The statement went on to emphasize that Davidenko had been tested several times before and after the April 7 test, all with negative results. "The Navigators Team has full confidence that this result was due to the

This time they’ll be sporting their own labels. While Litespeeds have been a part of the European peloton for years, the American framebuilder will now actually be supplying a team of riders on bikes that are marked as such. Lotto, the pro team sponsored by the Belgian national lottery, has announced a three-year sponsorship agreement with Tennessee-based Litespeed. The Belgian team had been riding GTs since July of 1999, but the recent bankruptcy and sale of Schwinn/GT left the future of that sponsorship in doubt. Litespeed director of marketing Herbert Krabel has been actively courting

Las Vegas, the beacon in the desert, is a particularly bright one for the bicycle industry in this challenging year. Coming into the fall, the bike business was already reeling from high-profile bankruptcies like Schwinn and GT and from having many other companies on life support. Then came September 11, and it seemed unlikely that many would even be willing to fly to Las Vegas for the major selling event of the entire year and the only time that small and mid-sized companies get to put their products in front of bike dealers. The heaving of a collective sigh of relief was almost audible

Wordin says Moninger will be back.

Zabel

New Sticker: Litespeed marketing director Herbert Krabel applies a new decal to a Blade, the TT bike to be used by the team next season.

Gary Fisher has not lost his fondness for expensive and distinctive clothes. Fisher can be easily prodded to talk about his own pet project, namely bikes with 700C wheels.