Cycling / Tim Brown : Football Carry-Over Helps Beck as Racer

OK, so another girl played high school football. Another story about becoming one of the boys. Big laughs over locker-room arrangements. All the usual stuff.

So what’s so different about this one?

Well, Katie Beck, who played football at Simi Valley High in her freshman and sophomore years, parlayed those experiences into cycling and, last week in the Junior National Championships in Colorado Springs, Colo., overcame numerous mechanical failures to place in the top 10 in five events.

Beck, 16, started racing bikes about a year ago. She entered local races, advanced to statewide events and then graduated to the Junior Nationals as a track and road racer.

None of which comes as a surprise to Dave Murphy, Simi Valley High’s football coach.

“We had a great experience with her,” Murphy said. “She has every coach on our staff’s respect. She earned the guys’ respect, also.

“There’s no doubt in my mind that she could succeed in a sport like cycling.”

So far, so good.

On a borrowed track bike, Beck was seventh in the two-kilometer pursuit final and the sprints final. On a borrowed road bike, she was ninth in the individual time trial, seventh in the road race and fifth in the criterium. This despite dropping her chain during the time trial, having a tire come off a rim in the road race and various crashes.

“I crashed everywhere I went,” said Beck, who is entering her junior year. “So it surprised me that I hung that well with them. I expected to be in 20th place--or last.”

Beck’s staying power can be linked to a degree to her time with the football team when she became familiar with the school’s weight room. The 5-foot-5, 135-pound Beck squat lifts 255 pounds and bench presses 135.

“I did a lot of weight training for football,” she said, “and I think that made up the difference in my muscles in training for cycling.”

Murphy was duly impressed.

“She does have great leg strength,” he said. “She’s extremely dedicated in the weight room. I gotta believe all the lifting helped her.”

Beck won’t play football this fall but said that she will try water polo instead to further develop her cardiovascular fitness and aid in her cycling. Beck is aiming for the 1992 Olympics.

“I wouldn’t give up cycling for anything,” she said. “It’s the greatest. You get hooked on it.”

Add Junior Nationals: Haldane Morris of Sherman Oaks was the most successful of the Valley-area men last week. In the 17-18 men’s division, he placed second in the three-kilometer pursuit final, fourth in the points-race final and fifth in the road race.

Quartz Hill’s Shawn Cronkhite, in the same division, was 10th in the individual time trial and second in the criterium, and Ryan Murphy of Van Nuys was eighth in the 15-16 men’s sprints final.

Laurie Ross, a Van Nuys resident in the 13-15 women’s division, was seventh in the sprints final.

Gaining Mo-mentum: Maureen (Mo) Manley of Thousand Oaks, a member of Team USA, left Thursday for Chambery, France, site of this year’s World Cycling Championships.

Manley qualified as part of the National Team’s team time trial, along with Peggy Maass, Linda Brennemen and Betsy Davis. Manley is the only member of Team USA riding with the National Team.

There is also a possibility of Manley competing in the road race, but she’s not counting on it.

“I’m really just shooting to shatter myself on the team time trial,” she said. “I don’t want to have enough left for the road race.

“When it’s time to go hard, I really go hard.”

The team time trial is scheduled for Wednesday, and the team will not return to Colorado Springs until a couple of days later. Manley, however, hasn’t planned any sight-seeing trips through France. “The only thing I want to see is a gold medal around my neck,” she said.