THESE ARE NOT REALLY EASY RIDERS : Top Foreign Cyclists Help Give an Old Race True International Flavor

Under the cover of expanding the sport of international bicycle racing into California, a noted Colorado brewery this week sent nearly 100 riders out onto the highways and byways of the Golden State, plus a corner of Nevada, in search of a greater market share for its product.

Drafting along behind were a convenience-store chain, a tea company, a power-tool manufacturer and assorted other enterprises, all with teams of cyclists wearing enough commercial logos to make NASCAR and CART envious.

Toss in a few national “amateur” teams from France, Colombia, Mexico, Holland, Ireland, Cuba, East Germany and the Soviet Union, and you have, as advertised, the best field money could buy for the XI Coors International bicycle races.

After pumping for 352 miles in five days, the men will take today off to travel by more conventional means, flying out of Reno Cannon International Airport bound for Grand Junction, Colo., where they’ll start another 605 miles of racing during a 10-day holiday in the Rockies.

About 50 women riders will ride along, covering 366 miles in that same time.

Leading in the men’s overall competition for $100,000 in prize money as the races’ first sojourn in the Far West ended was Greg LeMond, a former Reno resident who last month became the only American ever to finish as high as second in the prestigious Tour de France.

He took the lead Wednesday afternoon by winning the 69-mile road race from Incline Village, Nev., to Reno by way of Virginia City. LeMond outsprinted Andrew Hampsten of Boulder, Colo., after the two had pulled away and left the pack more than four minutes behind. LeMond’s winning time was 2 hours 21.56 minutes.

His total time for the event was 13 hours, 8 minutes, 27 seconds, giving him a lead of 1:25 over Hampsten. Canadian Steve Bauer, an Olympic silver medalist in Los Angeles last year, was third overall, followed by Steve Speaks of Waterloo, Iowa, and Bernard Hinault, who won this year’s Tour de France.

Davis Phinney, a 1984 Olympic bronze medalist from Boulder Colo., won Wednesday night’s Reno Criterium, avoiding a massive crash on the final turn involving Bauer, Jeff Pierce of San Diego and Jaanus Kuum, a Soviet defector who now resides in Norway. All suffered cuts and bruises but nothing more serious.

The presence of Hinault and LeMond has made this a major event, for a change. In previous years, the Tour de France, in late June and early July, conflicted with America’s No. 1 cycling showcase. A schedule change and the inclusion of stages in California and Nevada in 1985, however, were enough to attract the sport’s top names.

Hinault, 30, from the village of Quessoy on the northern coast of Brittany, has won the Tour de France five times and the Giro D’Italia three times. He is still recovering from a spill that broke his nose in two places during this year’s Tour, and some observers have questioned whether his U.S. visit was a sort of vacation.

LeMond, 24, is Hinault’s teammate--for La Vie Claire in Europe and for Red Zinger in the United States--and it has been generally believed that Hinault would help the American win over here since LeMond backed off in the final stages of the Tour to let the veteran Frenchman grab the glory in his native land.

As Phinney said at one point this week, “Bicycle racing is a business. There’s a lot of team strategy involved.” And La Vie Claire, a French health-food company, doubtless benefited more by having a Frenchman win the Tour de France than it would have if an American had won.

LeMond, who moved with his family from Los Angeles to Reno when he was 7, and who now splits his time between homes in Sacramento and Kortrijk, Belgium, figures to be the designated winner of the Tour de France in 1986. His popularity is growing in Europe, where he is as well known as Wimbledon champion Boris Becker of West Germany or golfer Seve Ballesteros of Spain.

LeMond also shares the same general income neighborhood with those two, having recently signed a four-year contract with La Vie Claire for $1.2 million, plus all the vitamins and minerals he needs.

Last Saturday, LeMond said: “Now, it’s my turn. This is my race.”

The theory that he would receive top billing in his native land was shaken a bit Tuesday, however, when Hinault won the toughest stage so far, 102 miles on California’s Highway 49 and 89 from Nevada City to Truckee via a 6,700-foot high Sierra pass. LeMond placed 11th.

Said Hinault, who had lagged behind during the earlier stages because he didn’t care for the courses: “See, I am not on vacation here. I did not care for the criteriums (closed-course races on San Francisco’s Fisherman’s Wharf and in Sacramento’s Old Town), so I took it easy. But now, I am looking forward to the remaining stages. I also want to enjoy each one and take time to look around at the beautiful countryside as I ride.”

Hinault stayed alert enough, however, to capitalize on Phinney’s mistake as they sprinted, wheel to wheel, around the final bend into Truckee’s Commercial Row.

Said Phinney: “We were never given a clear picture of the finish, so when I saw this banner across the street, I really went all out. The sun was in my eyes, and I couldn’t read it. By the time I could, it was too late. I was committed.”

The banner said: “Truckee Rodeo, Aug. 10-11.”

The finish banner was another block down the street, and Hinault, who prefers to speak French, obviously is able to read English. At the proper moment, he shot by the spent Phinney.

Other stage winners this week in the Coors event, which will be televised by NBC Sept. 1, were Ron Kiefel of Wheatridge, Colo., in Saturday’s 1.05-mile prologue up San Francisco’s Telegraph Hill; Canadian Alex Steida in Sunday’s 35-mile Fisherman’s Wharf Criterium; Bauer, in Monday’s 87-mile Sonoma-to-Sacramento road race, and Phinney in Monday night’s 28-mile Old Sacramento Criterium.

The Fisherman’s Wharf course, which was lined with an estimated 50,000 spectators, was called dangerous by LeMond, who finished a close second. “I stayed out front through fear,” he said. “I didn’t want to get caught in the middle of a pack going into one of those tight turns.”

And Steida, the winner, called it “The most dangerous course I’ve ever been on.”

Scuba divers were treading water in the bay during the race, waiting to rescue any cyclists who went off a pier.

The Old Sacramento course, part of it over cobblestones, did not rate much higher with LeMond, who also came in second there and then said: “It was crazy--too short and too dangerous. I stayed out front to avoid any crashes.”

Another tactic was tried by one Soviet rider in Tuesday’s road race. He stayed at the very back of the field, possibly hoping everyone would forget about him.

Then shortly before 6 that evening, an hour after Hinault had won the stage and as traffic was returning to normal, the lone Russian cycled down Truckee’s main street. Unfortunately for him, perhaps, the Soviet team van was still following right behind.