Second edition news for July 20, 2000

Australian Olympic team announced

23 of the 27 members of the Australian Road, Track and MTB teams were announced today by Cycling Australia. There were hints given yesterday of those who were left out, and today the complete Road, Mountain Bike, Men's Track Endurance and Women's Track squads were named. The men's four member sprint team is yet to be finalised.

The riders comprise arguably the strongest Olympic team Australia has fielded, however as mentioned yesterday the appeals by riders left out have already started. In addition to Kathy Watt, appeals have been lodged by Brent Dawson, Steven Wooldridge, and Scott Sunderland, all of whom were left out. These appeals will be heard by an independent tribunal within two weeks

The teams are as follows:

Mountain Bike

Cadel Evans
Paul Rowney
Rob Woods
Anna Baylis
Mary Grigson

Track

Brett Aitken
Graeme Brown
Brett Lancaster
Brad McGee
Scott McGrory
Luke Roberts
Michael Rogers
Alayna Burns
Michelle Ferris
Lyndelle Higginson.

Road

Robbie McEwen
Stuart O'Grady
Nathan O'Neill
Henk Vogels
Matthew White
Juanita Feldhahn
Tracey Gaudry
Anna Wilson

US Women's Olympic Road Team

The final two members of the United States Olympic road squad were named today, to join automatic qualifier Nicole Freedman (Charles Schwab) who won the US Olympic trials. Mari Holden (Timex) and Karen Kurreck (Edil Savino) were given the final berths ahead of some strong opposition. Holden, from Colorado Springs, is a six-time national road cycling champion and has had a very consistent year this year, winning and placing in most of the National Series events as well as winning the US Olympic time trial title for the past three years.

Karen Kurreck (Los Altos, California) is a past world champion in the time trial (in 1994) and is one of the most experienced US female cyclists. She finished second at the US Time Trial Championships this year and has competed in a total of seven World Championships.

The three combined with the speed of Nicole Freedman will comprise a strong unit when they contest the Sydney course which is very suited to power riders. This will be the first Olympic Games for each of them, and they are scheduled to compete in the International Thuringen Rundfahrt in Germany later this month (July 25-30). Following this they will ride the Grande Boucle Feminine Internationale (women's Tour de France - August 6-20) and the Killington (Vt.) Stage Race (September 2-4).