
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: MONDAY, May 29, 1995                   TAG: 9506010011
SECTION: SPORTS                    PAGE: B7   EDITION: HOLIDAY 
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: MARTINSBURG, W.VA.                                 LENGTH: Short

ARMSTRONG CYCLING WINNER

Tour DuPont champion Lance Armstrong had little trouble retaining a commanding lead in a steady rain across rolling hills Sunday to capture his second Kmart Classic cycling championship in three years.

Armstrong, 23, of Austin, Texas, finished the six-day, 514-mile race in 21 hours, 12 minutes and 57 seconds for Team Motorola, 4:31 ahead of teammate Frankie Andreu, 28, of Dearborn, Mich. (Results in Scoreboard. B10).

Team Saturn's Brian Walton, 29, of Canada, finished third. Jeff Evanshine, 20, of Placentia, Calif., was the top amateur finisher in 11th.

Armstrong had the 4:31 lead heading into the last stage of the Kmart Classic, a 107.5-mile circuit through the state's Eastern Panhandle that began and ended in Martinsburg.

He finished among a large pack at the end, just behind final-stage winner Tom Steels, and placed 41st for the stage.

Steels, 24, of Belgium, won the stage in 4:02:31, a fast pace despite a steady rain that fell for most of the race. The stage ended with five trips around a 3.1-mile circuit.

Armstrong, the 1993 world road race champion and the winner of Tour DuPont earlier this month, took the overall lead Friday when he finished the 110-mile stage from Beckley to Hinton in 4:42:45. That stage was the course's toughest and offered the kind of long, steep roads at which Armstrong excels.

by CNB