Connie Paraskevin Keeps Churning for Olympic Gold : Match Sprint Cycling Champion, a Woman Without a Race in ‘84, Now Preparing for ’88

There are several Olympic medalists among the cyclists spinning around the Velodrome at Cal State Dominguez Hills this weekend, riding the high-banked walls in the 7-Eleven/Bicycling Magazine Grand Prix and feeling right at home at the ’84 Olympic site.

Connie Paraskevin is not one of the Olympic medalists.

It’s not that she’s not good enough to have won a medal. She’s the world champion and world record-holder in the women’s match sprint event. In fact, she is reigning as the world champion for the third straight year. She’s the only American to successfully defend a world title in cycling.

The problem is her event was not part of the 1984 Olympics. Until last summer, there was no Olympic cycling competition for women at all. Then, when one women’s event was added in time for the ’84 Games, it was a 50-kilometer road race.

Women’s match sprints will finally make an Olympic appearance in 1988 at Seoul, South Korea.

So, of course, the script calls for Paraskevin to come riding into the infield (which, for effect, is dressed up with hedges planted in the form of the Olympic rings) after a grueling ride, wipe the sweat from her brow and, between gasps, announce with grim determination that, at the age of 23, after dedicating her life to cycling for 13 years to win eight national championships and three world championships, she is postponing a well-deserved retirement and pledging the next four years of her life to the quest for the all-important Olympic gold.

She could play the role of martyr (why were there no women’s events before this?), valiant champion (risking her

titles instead of going out on top) and national heroine (sacrifice for the U.S Olympic effort) all at the same time.

Great theater. Too bad she doesn’t fit the part.

Instead, Paraskevin arrives early for a morning workout, takes a seat in the bleachers, comments on the sweet smell of honeysuckle that surrounds the new facility, and says that she would have stayed in cycling for a few more years, Olympics or no Olympics.

Furthermore, she would have continued to train full time for the Olympics in ’88 even if she had won a gold medal in ’84.

“I really respect gold medalists who stay with it after the Olympics,” she said. “That’s special.”

And, besides, this is no time to get out of cycling. There are too many good things happening right now.

More corporate sponsorship, more promotions, more new facilities--like the one at Cal State Dominguez Hills.

“Having the Olympics here helped bring up interest in our sport,” Paraskevin said. “The next World Championships will be in Colorado Springs and the next Pan Am Games will be in Indianapolis.

“I’m really looking forward to both of those.”

Paraskevin, who grew up in Detroit, has moved to Indianapolis to train at the cycling facility there. She is concentrating on cycling, exclusively now, after working for many years on the common double of cycling and speed skating. Like her former teammates, Eric and Beth Heiden and Sheila Young-Ochowicz, she changed with the seasons. Paraskevin was on the U.S. speed skating national team from 1977 through 1984 and won two bronze medals in the World Sprint Speed Skating Championships.

But now cycling has her full attention. And it is a fulltime job. For the last few months she has been here, in “spring training” with the 7-Eleven team.

That means that on a daily basis she trains with such talents as Mark Gorski, the Olympic sprint gold medalist.

“It’s very good for me, because it means that in practice, I’m always chasing,” Paraskevin said.

And she gets challenging competition in the games of cat-and-mouse that are as much a part of the match sprints as the power needed to set speed records.

In the match sprints, two cyclists take the track for a 1,000-meter ride--but only the last 200 meters are timed. The first two laps are for tactical jockeying and psychological jockeying.

With the help of Coach Roger Young, Paraskevin has mastered both.

Saturday afternoon, Paraskevin easily won two straight match sprints to advance to the finals in the program that will begin today at 4 p.m.

She will ride against Rebecca Twigg, a teammate on the 7-Eleven team and the silver medalist in the road race, the only Olympic event for women last summer.

Rory O’Reilly, Pan American Games gold medalist, won the kilometer race final Saturday in 1:07.75. Kurt Harnett, Olympic silver medalist, was second in 1:08.07, and Gene Samuels was third in 1:08.25.

In the finals of the match sprints this afternoon, Gorski and Allesandro Onegaro will ride for first and second place, and Curt Harnett and Nelson Vails will ride for third and fourth place.

In the finals of the women’s match sprints, where Paraskevin and Twigg will compete for first place, Melody Wong and Maria Wisser will compete for third place.

Twigg will also be racing for first place in the women’s individual pursuit against Patty Cashman. Harriet McCoy and Sheri Bowen will race for third place.

Dave Lettieri and Sean Wallace will race for first place in men’s individual pursuit, and Kevin Lutz and Pat McDonough will race for third place.