Cycling has been an Olympic sport since the first Modern Olympic Games in 1896. The events and conditions have changed many times since, and this Olympic Games will see a new side of the sport with the introduction of mountain bike racing.
In the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta, cycling is divided into three separate disciplines: road, track and mountain bike racing. Although all three use two-wheeled machines, they are as different as football and tennis. Track racing takes place on steeply banked tracks called velodromes (the prefix velo is short for the French velocipeded, the bicycle’s original name). Road racing, as the name implies, takes place on the roadways. Mountain bike racing takes place off-road in the mountains, usually on a specially designed course which runs through mountainous or wooded areas.
Only amateur athletes are allowed to participate in the Olympic Games. More than 500 cyclists are racing neck and neck in a fight for the gold in one of 14 medal events:
Even the laymen think Tour de France when they put a bike on the road. The road race conjures all the images of man against nature...on a bike: sprints and climbs under a beating sun. Add someone on your heels to it, and you’ve got a challenge.
Now that the sport has become totally "open" -- that old "professional versus amateur" question — this will be the toughest Games ever for cyclists. The level of competition will jump, and unless you’ve got Italy, France, Spain or Belgium on your jersey, you’re going to have a tough race on your hands.
That doesn’t mean there’s no room for surprises. Rebecca TWIGG (USA) was the favorite in the women’s road race in 1984, but rode home with the silver. Teammate Connie CARPENTER-PHINNEY had a surprise technique that brought her the gold: as they neared the finish line neck-and-neck, CARPENTER-PHINNEY threw her bike forward and won by half a wheel. At this elite level of competition, athletes look for anything to give them an edge. Unfortunately, looking for that edge killed Knut JENSEN (DEN) in 1960. He collapsed of suspected sunstroke — another danger of the road — only to be caught for illegal drug use.
The sport has its dangers. On top of sun and exhaustion, accidents and injuries, there’s the rugged terrain. One of road’s favorites, 1992 gold medalist Fabio CASARTELLI (ITA), will be sorely missed. He crashed on a descent in the Pyranees during Stage 15 of his first Tour de France last year. He was not wearing a helmet. It was the third fatality in the tour’s 92-year history.
In this sport, skill, stamina, speed and strategy are the name of the game. Strategy is what changes it from recreation into sport.
In addition to the road race, the discipline will be contested in its purer form — the individual time trial, in which a cyclist, poised on his or her ramp, takes off every 60 seconds in a race against the clock. The French call it the "race of truth" because no other cycling event pushes a rider to his or her limit on the road in a race solely against the clock.
This is an official publication of The Atlanta Committee for the Olympic Games Sports Publications Department.
Written by Jennifer Knight.
| The Mother Nature was kind to Olympic athletes and spectators. The average high temperature during the Games was 89 degrees with an average low of 72 degrees. Highest temperature registered (20 July) - 99 degrees. Lowest high temperature registered is 79 degrees (28 July). |