Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, May 1, 1994 TAG: 9405030074
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: TDP1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: ANDREA KUHN STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
Billed as America's premier cycling event, the road race runs from from Wilmington, Del., to Winston-Salem, N.C., with a crucial mountain time trial in the Roanoke Valley squeezed in the middle.
The course is suited to cyclists who specialize in climbing and time trials and puts the pressure on pure sprinters. There are 20 climbs over the 1,060-mile course, compared with 12 in 1,085 miles last year.
To win this year's $40,000 first prize, a rider will have to limit his losses in the time trials while shining in the tortuous mountain stages of Virginia and North Carolina.
"There's no doubt it will be won or lost in the mountains," said Mike Plant, president of Medalist Sports Inc., the Tour DuPont's Richmond-based organizer.
"I would be very surprised if the person with the yellow [leader's] jersey going into Roanoke still has it when they reach Winston-Salem," Plant said.
The Tour DuPont, the world's top-ranked non-European race, has attracted five of the world's top 10 teams this year competing for a variety of objectives and purses.
In addition to the overall title, money and international points are awarded for winning individual stages and specialty jerseys. A minimum of $200,000 is up for grabs.
Not all of the 17 teams - with seven cyclists each - are strong enough to win the overall team or individual title. Teams, therefore, must decide what they realistically can win and implement strategies to help them achieve their goals and the goals of their sponsors.
Among the favorites to win the overall title this year are Mexico's Raul Alcala and the United States' Greg LeMond and Lance Armstrong.
Armstrong, who rides for team Motorola, is the 1993 world road race champion. He finished second behind Alcala in the Tour DuPont last year.
Known as a strong climber and a consistent time trialist, Armstrong has had a good spring season. He finished second April 17 in the Liege-Bastogna-Liege race, an important spring classic event in Belgium.
Armstrong, a native of Austin, Texas, also is highly motivated. He considers the Tour DuPont his national race and clearly was disappointed last year when he lost to Alcala.
Alcala, a two-time Tour DuPont winner, raced for WordPerfect last year but has joined forces with Armstrong and Motorola. Alcala also is known as one of the world's premier climbers.
With such a 1-2 punch, Motorola will have to make some interesting tactical decisions, with Alcala possibly being asked to play a supporting roll to his American teammate.
LeMond, the best cyclist the United States has produced, is a question mark.
In 1992, the last time LeMond raced in the Tour DuPont, he won. It also was his last significant victory. The three-time Tour de France winner bypassed the American race last year, turning his attention instead to the Tour of Italy and preparation for the Tour de France.
LeMond had a down year in 1993, suffering from severe allergy problems in the spring and missing the second half of the season after crashing and breaking his right wrist in July.
But LeMond has returned to the Tour DuPont with strong team support. The two-time world champion is racing for team Gan, a French insurance giant that usually sticks to European races.
LeMond has implemented a new training method this year and said he is in "decent shape."He usually trains in Europe, but has been in Asheville, N.C. the past few weeks to prepare for the mountain stages of the Tour DuPont.
"I was riding as well at the end of January as I am now," said LeMond, who classifies himself as a June-July rider. "I'm starting to feel good now, but it's difficult to say what kind of shape I'm in. Out of 14 years of racing, I've had maybe four or five years where I had good results in May. A lot of that has to do with allergies."
Like Armstrong, LeMond said he was also highly motivated to win in the United States.
Among the other cyclists considered to be contenders for the overall title: Thierry Claveyrolat of Gan, Atle Kvalsvoll and Viatcheslav Ekimov of team WordPerfect, Bart Bowen and Scott Mercier of team Saturn, Malcolm Elliott of team Chevrolet-LA Sheriff, Jean-Francois Bernard of the Spanish team Banesto and Djamolidine Abdoujaparov of the Italian team Polti.
Kvalsvoll, a Norwegian, is considered one of the strongest climbers in the field. He has finished second in the Tour DuPont three times and was third last year.
Ekimov, a Russian standout, is a good time trialist and has a powerful team in WordPerfect.
Bowen and Mercier, both Americans, specialize in climbing. Bowen finished seventh overall last year, and Mercier won the King of the Mountains jersey as the top climber in the race.
Elliott and Abdoujaparov are among the top sprinters in the world and likely will duel for the sprint points jersey. The pair also could be among the leaders throughout the race, but they will have to perform superlatively in the mountains and the time trials to win.
The race starts May 4 with the Prologue, the first of three critical time trials where cyclists race against the clock. The course is three miles long, winding through the streets of downtown Wilmington, Del.
The Prologue gives riders a chance to scout the field, see what kind of shape their opponents are in and get rid of any prerace jitters. It also establishes who will wear the yellow leader's jersey the next day during Stage 1.
Three of the past four years, the winner of the Prologue has gone on to win the overall race, with the exception being Alcala last year.
Stages 1-4 (May 5-8) are flat road races where the top sprinters are likely to strut their stuff on the way to the top of the standings.
Riders such as Elliott, Abdoujaparov and American Scott McKinley will have a chance to shine, along with Wiebren Veenstra of the Belgian team Collstrop, who won two of the first four stages and the sprint jersey last year.
Jelle Nijdam of WordPerfect, the Prologue winner in 1993, also likely will be among the leaders.
All of the opening stages end on a downtown circuit, including Stage 4 from Richmond to Lynchburg, which also is the longest of the road stages at 131 miles. After that, the cyclists hit the hills.
Stage 5 in Roanoke is the first mountain time trial in the Tour DuPont's short history and has been described by competitors as "scary," "cruel" and "brutal." Cyclists start at the Salem Civic Center and make climbs over Twelve O'Clock Knob and Mount Chestnut before zipping to the finish line at the market in downtown Roanoke.
Many cycling experts predict the stage will mark a definite turning point in the overall race.
"The key to winning is the Roanoke time trial," said John Wilcockson, editor of VeloNews, a top cycling magazine. "It's very important. If you lose one or more minutes to the winner, you'll be out of it.
"Somebody has to be patient over the first few days and prepare well. If you don't do well in the Roanoke time trial, you won't have a chance to win the Tour DuPont."
Jim Birrell, Medalist's course designer, also described the stage as significant.
"I'd say it's very important because it's a mountain time trial and that's different," Birrell said. "But you're not only thinking about [the time trial], you're thinking about what could happen after. Roanoke will be the first opportunity for a guy who's good on the hills to get real close to wearing the yellow jersey.
"[Climbers] are going to gain time on the flatlanders. This is going to be the introduction of those [top] names and their first chance to move slowly up that ladder."
Steve Hegg, a member of team Chevrolet-LA Sheriff and a premier climber, has ridden the course. He agreed the stage was tough, but said it made the race more interesting and challenging.
But it also could take some cyclists by surprise, he said.
"Time trials like this are one of the neat things about bike racing," said Hegg, who finished 10th overall last year. "Because of this Tour, the riders know all those mountains around you. Because Roanoke is in a geographically less-cycled area, they don't know about this [stage]."
Three serious mountain road stages follow the time trial in Roanoke, which is when strong climbers such as Armstrong, Alcala and Kvalsvoll will make their moves.
Stage 6 on May 10 features five climbs over a 138-mile course. Cyclists meet the toughest climb - over 4,000-foot Mountain Lake - with three mountains and 115 miles already behind them.
Riders then must tackle Brush Mountain before winding around Blacksburg and finishing at the mall on the Virginia Tech campus.
Cyclists leave Virginia on May 11 during punishing Stage 7, which features six mountains over 125 miles from Wytheville to Beech Mountain, N.C. The remaining stages of the race are in North Carolina.
Stage 8 on May 12 is just as grueling, so fatigue will become a definite factor for the cyclists. The stage has six climbs over 125 miles from Banner Elk to Asheville.
After four days of climbing, riders get a breather May 13-14 during stages 9 and 10, which are relatively flat.
Stage 9 starts in Asheville and has a significant climb over Hickory Mountain Gap before leveling and finishing furiously in uptown Charlotte.
Stage 10 is a "short," 75-mile trek starting in Concord and featuring sprint lines in the towns of Salisbury, Lexington, Thomasville and Archdale before finishing in a tight sprint through downtown High Point.
Stage 11 on May 15 is the final stage, a slightly rolling, 16.6-mile time trial from Kernersville to Winston-Salem.
The time trial offers one last chance for the top riders to make up time they might have lost in the mountains, and it often shapes the final standings of the race.
by CNB