Howard Enjoys Spill of Victory : Cycling: Despite fall, John Howard wins in Sorrento Cyclocross.

After seven national cycling championships in a competitive career that has made him a legend, John Howard is hard-pressed to think of something he hasn’t done on a bike. Sunday, he woke up at 6 a.m. and decided to enter cycling’s version of the Baja 1,000: the Sorrento Cyclocross.

Three hours later, Howard, a former Olympic cyclist who lives in Encinitas, was on his way way to another championship after a bumpy, treacherous 6.5-mile wilderness ride on the campus of UC San Diego. The race was sponsored by the San Diego Bicycling Club and sanctioned by the U.S. Cycling Federation.

Howard, 43, easily out-pedaled the rest of the field in the public veteran (35-and-older) division and also blew away a bunch of 18-and-younger public junior division competitors who shared the same race.

The Sorrento Cyclocross is not a smooth ride for any winner, however, and Howard took his share of punishment, spilling on a steep turn. Among cyclists, cyclocross is considered a test of athleticism and endurance as its races are held on off-road courses filled with natural and man-made obstacles that force the riders to dismount and carry their bikes at certain junctures.

It would seem that Howard, the angular, graying five-time national road-racing champion, would find something better to do on a chilly, breezy December Sunday. Holiday shopping, perhaps.

“It seemed like the thing to do,” Howard said. “Racing is not a real draw for me. I enjoy the recreation side. But every now and then I get the bug to get out and mix it up with the guys.”

Even guys 20 years his junior, who still find Howard at the top of his sport.

“I try to stay in very good shape,” he said. “This is hard as hell. It takes major conditioning to get through this. You have to be in superior condition to do well, not to mention you have to dismount a bike and be able to carry it over a barrier.”

Howard was riding a 28-pound KHS mountain bike. But after about a half hour and only five laps on a 1.3-mile course that winds through a eucalyptus grove east of UCSD’s North Campus athletic facilities, Howard said the bike “weighed a ton.”

While Howard proved to be the biggest name at this 18th annual race, Todd Clark of Menlo Park captured the biggest event, the 11.7-mile USCF senior men pro-am. Clark, who races for the Melo Velo team, barely edged five-time national cyclocross champion Lawrence Malone of New Mexico.

Clark, however, didn’t stick around to pick up his winnings, a $900 mountain racing bike. That’s because a protest caused officials to delay the announcement of the race results for more than an hour. Clark apparently was one who got tired of waiting. The officials, who originally failed to identify one of the top 15 finishers, also neglected to time the race. Clark finished in about 1:07.

This was Howard’s first cyclocross since 1978, when he competed in the nationals at Berkeley. Now a coach for professional racers, Howard is recognized for his achievements on blacktop, but cyclocross is hardly uncharted turf for him. One of his seven national championships came in cyclocross in 1969, “when mountain bikes didn’t exist.” In 1971, he won a cycling gold medal at the Pan-Am Games. And, along with his five road-racing titles, he owns a national off-road crown.

In recent years, he’s been more noted for winning the Hawaii Ironman Triathlon in 1981, or having his name listed in the Guinness Book of World Records for riding the world’s fastest bike. In July, 1985, Howard rode a modified bike with a large tail section designed to diminish wind resistance at the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah. Through his power and the draft of a pace car, Howard reached 152.284 m.p.h.

But Howard’s most remarkable feat came in 1982, when he raced a 10-speed from the Santa Monica pier in Los Angeles to the Empire State Building in New York, stopping only to sleep, in the first Race Across America, then known as the Great American Bike Race. Howard covered the U.S. in 10 days 10 hours and finished second to Lon Haldeman by about eight hours.

“I was in a lot of pain, but I stayed in the race because I couldn’t have lived with myself if I’d quit,” he said.

What’s next for Howard? How about pedaling boats.

On Dec. 7, he powered a prototype trimaran, designed by business partner Sid Shutt, from Dana Point to Catalina Island in 6 1/2 hours. Howard said he and Shutt hope to popularize “aqua-cycling.”

But Sunday, Howard was churning and stumbling on a mountain bike, beating kids and having a blast. At one point, he accelerated too much on a downhill grade and had to over-compensate on a sharp right turn. He went into a slide, caught his handle bar on a tree and was hurled onto the dusty trail.

“I guess I got a bit too crazy,” said Howard, who dusted himself off then beat everybody.