Cycling’s bright light

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Taylor Phinney, who recently turned 18, won the junior world championship for the second time by taking the 3,000-meter individual pursuit gold medal today in Cape Town, South Africa.

Phinney, whose father Davis was the first American to ever win a Tour de France stage and who is recovering well from recent brain surgery that was done to help slow the progression of Parkinson’s disease, is aiming for a cycling short-track gold medal in Beijing.

But his long-term plans are more wide-ranging. After this Olympics cycle, Taylor wants to follow his father’s footsteps and move to international road racing and eventually race the Tour de France.

In this interview with VeloNews, America’s first Tour de France overall winner, Greg LeMond, speaks about how he sees Phinney as a future Tour winner.

If the sport is to ever get past this age of riders who are struggling to get away from a doping culture, it will be on the legs of young riders like Phinney. He has become internationally competitive in less than two years and is a legitimate medal threat in Beijing. And Davis Phinney, who had surgery in May at Stanford, felt well enough to travel to South Africa for the junior world championships. Both he and his wife, Connie Carpenter-Phinney, are Olympic cycling medalists, and Taylor’s story will surely be well-told in Beijing.

-- Diane Pucin