Tour Du Pont

TODAYTour Du Pont. World-class cyclists head out of Sharpsburg on their way to Virginia. (804) 354-9934.TOMORROWPee-Wee Preakness. Rash Field in Inner Harbor. Children race on hobbyhorses as mascots cheer on the young "jockeys." 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. (410) 837-4636. Free.AT&T Great Schooner Race. Historic schooners compete against each other at 3 p.m. from the Inner Harbor Finger Piers. Witness race from docks. (410) 837-3030. Free.Maryland Preakness Celebration Frog Hop. Fells Point, Broadway Market Square.

CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- On a 94-degree day highlighted by a heated sprint finish, Lance Armstrong coolly took another step toward a second straight victory in the Tour DuPont yesterday.Armstrong retained the yellow jersey that designates the overall leader in the 12-day, 1,225-mile race, but lost his sponsor when Motorola announced it would not renew its sponsorship of his team after the 1997 season.Armstrong holds a 1-minute, 58-second lead over Pascal Herve of France with three stages remaining.

The Tour Du Pont bicycle race is inching closer to a stop in Maryland, according to Steve Brunner, a spokesman for tour organizer Medalist Sports, and Maryland Sports Promotion director Mike Marqua.While neither would say where in Maryland the pro bike tour will be May 11, both agree they should have the definite site signed, sealed and delivered early next week."We've reached a tentative agreement with another city [outside Baltimore]," said Brunner. "But there are some final details to be worked out. We don't want to jump the gun at this time, by saying everything is settled.

For the first time in its seven-year history, the Tour DuPont international cycling race will not run through Maryland in 1995, race organizers announced yesterday.The annual 11-stage, 12-day, 15-city event will begin April 26 with its traditional three-mile prologue from Wilmington, Del., and end May 7 with a 20-mile individual time trial in the Piedmont Triad area of North Carolina.But after three years of running a stage the 115 miles between Port Deposit and Hagerstown, the race will bypass Maryland completely.

WILMINGTON, Del. -- Greg LeMond, the best known American cyclist and a three-time Tour de France champion, is back.Defending champion Raul Alcala and his most formidable 1993 challenger, Lance Armstrong, are both riding for Motorola this year.They are among 112 riders competing in the 1,060-mile Tour Du Pont, America's premier cycling event. The 12-day race begins today in Wilmington with a 2.98-mile prologue. The fastest rider in the prologue gets to wear the yellow leader's jersey during the first stage of the race tomorrow from Dover to Wilmington, a flat 75-mile course.

...TC The Tour de Trump, the showcase of bicycle racing in the United States in 1989 and 1990, now will be the Tour Du Pont and will be sanctioned internationally as a professional event.Baltimore was one of the key stops on the Tour de Trump and probably still will be a major city on the 1,103-mile course that will run from Wilmington, Del. -- headquarters of the Du Pont Corp. -- to Boston May 9 to 19."We've been in contact with the people [Medalist Sports Inc. of Richmond, Va.] who will direct the race for Du Pont," said Bill Gilmore, acting director of the Baltimore Office of Promotion.

The Tour Du Pont bicycle race will include Maryland after all.Officials announced today that the race, previously known as the Tour de Trump, will finish a 130-mile stage in Columbia on Saturday, May 11.Elite cyclists from around the world depart Newark, Del., at 9:30 a.m. and race 136 miles through the rural Maryland towns of Rising Sun, Port Deposit, Conowingo, Forest Hill, Butler, Gamber, Winfield, and Glenelg en route to the finish in Howard County....

The Tour Du Pont, the largest and most prestigious bicycle race in the United States, will return to Maryland in May, but not to Baltimore."We are speaking with several cities in Maryland other than Baltimore, and we are very close to reaching an agreement, but we're not going to jump the gun and pinpoint anyone yet," said Virginia Smith, an official of Medalist Sports, which is directing the race. "We should have everything signed, sealed and delivered by early next week."Mike Marqua of the Maryland State Office of Promotion said: "We are trying very hard to keep the race in Maryland.

HAGERSTOWN -- German sprinter Sven Teutenberg passed five cyclists in the last of three circuits in downtown Hagerstown to win the second stage of the Tour Du Pont yesterday.The German team -- Teutenberg, his brother Lars, and Rajmund Lehnert -- used an attack strategy in the final several hundred yards of the 115-mile race, which brought some excitement to an otherwise uneventful road race along Maryland's northern tier.Teutenberg, 21, finished the Port Deposit-to-Hagerstown road race in 5 hours, 56 minutes, 29 seconds, an average speed of 19.35 mph. Lehnert, 29, and Gianvito Martinelli of Italy followed .. Teutenberg to the finish line.

HAGERSTOWN -- Motorola rider Phil Anderson leaned into the last turn at about 40 mph. His goggles were dusty, his legs pounding, his long blond pigtail trailing behind him.The finish was in sight, just up the next hill and if he could shake Davis Phinney, he knew he could catch Chevrolet/LA Sheriff's rider Steve Hegg, who was just ahead.It was then he heard the noise and looked back. There on the hot asphalt were Phinney and his bike, and there, too, was the rest of the field, scrambling to avoid crashing into him.Now Anderson had only one rider to beat.

HAGERSTOWN -- German sprinter Sven Teutenberg passed five cyclists in the last of three circuits in downtown Hagerstown to win the second stage of the Tour Du Pont yesterday.The German team -- Teutenberg, his brother Lars, and Rajmund Lehnert -- used an attack strategy in the final several hundred yards of the 115-mile race, which brought some excitement to an otherwise uneventful road race along Maryland's northern tier.Teutenberg, 21, finished the Port Deposit-to-Hagerstown road race in 5 hours, 56 minutes, 29 seconds, an average speed of 19.35 mph. Lehnert, 29, and Gianvito Martinelli of Italy followed .. Teutenberg to the finish line.

WILMINGTON, Del. -- Raul Alcala of Mexico, a two-time Tour Du Pont champion, is back in the coveted yellow leader's jersey.Alcala won yesterday's 2.98-mile prologue on the rain-soaked streets of Wilmington in 6 minutes, 25.7 seconds."

Hampstead will be flashed around the world Friday when the Tour DuPont bike race whizzes through town.At 12:20 p.m., about 128 bicyclists will enter Carroll County on Black Rock Road east of Hampstead. They'll ride into town behind St. John's United Methodist Church, turn north on Route 30 near Bob's Variety Store, ride up Main Street, then go west on Route 482, past North Carroll High School, and on into Westminster along Railroad Avenue, en route to Frederick County and Hagerstown.Tour DuPont is an 11-day race that begins today in Wilmington, Del., and ends in Greensboro, N.C. Last year, a crowd cheered the racers onward through Hampstead as the pack slowed around St. John's Church.

WILMINGTON, Del. -- Greg LeMond, the best known American cyclist and a three-time Tour de France champion, is back.Defending champion Raul Alcala and his most formidable 1993 challenger, Lance Armstrong, are both riding for Motorola this year.They are among 112 riders competing in the 1,060-mile Tour Du Pont, America's premier cycling event. The 12-day race begins today in Wilmington with a 2.98-mile prologue. The fastest rider in the prologue gets to wear the yellow leader's jersey during the first stage of the race tomorrow from Dover to Wilmington, a flat 75-mile course.

HAGERSTOWN -- Yesterday's third stage of the Tour Du Pont cycling event came down to one fairly simple decision for Britain's Sean Yates.Midway through the final lap of the 115.6-mile stage, Yates, the 1992 British national champion and a member of the Motorola team, could either stay in the three-man pack with Americans Jim Copeland and Roy Knickman, or blast away and dare them to catch up.Guess which one he chose?"

WILMINGTON, Del. -- There's clearly a lot of cycling left in this year's Tour DuPont event, but a clear pattern is starting to emerge.Though the overall victory in the 11-day event will go to an individual, it seems that, after two stages, that person may well come from the fledgling WordPerfect team.In its first year of sponsorship, the Utah-based computer software manufacturer already has assembled a team that has the top four individual riders and five in the top six.The seven-member team, led by individual overall leader Jelle Nijdam and pre-race favorite Raul Alcala, won overwhelmingly in last night's second stage in a 15.4-mile team time trial.

Gianni Bugno, the Italians say, has "La Grinta."It is more than just a grittiness or a ruggedness. The literal translation is "grim effort or sport's most intense fighting spirit."In the United States, it might most easily be described as that image of NBA superstar Michael Jordan, tongue clenched between his teeth, flying in like a 747 for a slam-dunk over some poor defenseless defender.That's "La Grinta."It's Gianni Bugno coming out of a pack of riders on a torturous climb, charging the air with every determined pump of the pedals, leaving his fellow competitors with no doubt that this is Gianni Bugno who is about to slam-dunk every last one of them.

WILMINGTON, Del. -- When anyone suggests Greg LeMond is the greatest competitor in professional bicycle racing and a favorite in whatever race he is running, his expression is always the same: like that of a deer caught unexpectedly in a car's headlights late at night.The last thing he needs, as the Tour Du Pont begins with its prologue here this evening, is to be fingered as the favorite.This, after all, is not his race. It's not even LeMond's time of the year."If I could schedule this race, I'd make it two weeks before the Tour de France or a week after," LeMond said yesterday.

WILMINGTON, Del. -- Jelle Nijdam isn't silly enough to take his win in the prologue of the Tour Du Pont cycling event last night and make something grand out of it.Nijdam is, after all, a specialist in these kinds of races, the sprints that determine seeding for the first stage of the main event.In that sense, Nijdam, 29, is the Brady Anderson of the WordPerfect team, and it's his job to smooth the way for the team's heavy hitter, Raul Alcala of Monterrey, Mexico.So, even though Nijdam was the only participant in the 118-man field to ride the 2.98-mile course in less than 6 minutes (5:55:07)

WILMINGTON, Del. -- Davis Phinney and Raul Alcala have ver different outlooks on how this year's Tour Du Pont will turn out, which isn't so surprising since they'll attack America's biggest cycling event in very different ways.Phinney, 33, of Boulder, Colo., is one of the world's best sprinters, which means that large portions of the Tour Du Pont, namely the mountain stages, will be lost to him."Davis Phinney will not get up those hills. I can guarantee you that," said Phinney yesterday.Alcala, on the other hand, is one of the kings of the mountains and the time trials, so the early portion of the 11-day, 1,085-mile course won't be terribly pleasing to the 29-year-old native of Monterrey, Mexico.