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Mountain Biking Joins Olympics

CONYERS, Ga. (AP) -- Three-time world champion Paola Pezzo of Italy won the inaugural women's mountain bike race at the Olympics today.

Canada's Alison Sydor, the two-time defending world champion, won the silver, and Susan DeMattei, of Gunnison, Colo., took the bronze.

Pezzo finished the nearly 24-mile race in one hour, 50 minutes and 51 seconds. Sydor was a 1:07 behind and DeMattei 1:45 behind the winner.

Juli Furtado, of Durango, Colo., a pre-race medal favorite, finished 10th, but was exuberantly slapping fans' hands as she made her way to the finish line.

DeMattei's was just the third cycling medal for the Americans in 10 events so far.

Her finish gives the American cyclists their most medals since 1984 in Los Angeles, when they took advantage of the boycotting Eastern bloc to win 15 medals.

U.S. cyclists won just one bronze medal in Seoul and had a two-bronze finish in Barcelona.

Mountain biking is as American as baseball. Still, cyclist Don Myrah makes no apologies for today's disappointing U.S. men's finishes in the first-ever Olympic dirt bike race.

``The guys who won today are the Michael Jordans and Joe Montanas of cycling,'' said Myrah, of Saratoga, Calif.

Reigning world champion Bart Jan Brentjens of the Netherlands won the men's race, covering the 30-mile circuit, in 2 hours, 17 minutes and 38 seconds, more than 2 1/2 minutes ahead of his closest competitor.

Thomas Frischknecht of Switzerland took the silver, and France's Miguel Martinez, the runner-up at last year's world championships as a 19-year-old, did a wheelie as he crossed the finish line for the bronze.

The top American finisher was David ``Tinker'' Juarez, of Los Angeles. He wound up 19th, 17 1/2 minutes behind the winner, and was followed by Myrah 35 seconds later.

Juarez, who got his nickname because he used to tinker with bikes as a boy, is the world's most famous and wealthiest mountain biker. But he said he was so intent on winning at home that he must have overtrained.

``I just did too much riding and too much racing,'' he shrugged. ``I didn't give myself any energy at all to race.''

While mountain biking was invented in California in the 1970s, Europeans have dominated the men's circuit during the past several years. Before today's Olympic debut, Myrah said this was a chance for Americans to excel at their own game.

``Tinker and I gave it our all,'' Myrah said. ``I hope everybody understands, and that this won't hurt our sport here.''

Forty-three men and 29 women rode in the races held at the Olympic equestrian venue. The women did about 24 miles on a 6.6-mile course carved out of rocky, rolling land 20 miles outside Atlanta.

Between 35,000 and 40,000 fans lined the course, and NBC placed 40 cameras along the circuit at the Georgia International Horse Park.

``I hope people will see it and be inspired and just want to go out and ride a mountain bike,'' DeMattei said.