CYCLING WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS : Paraskevin-Young Upset in Match Sprint

About 40 of the United States’ best professionals and amateurs will compete in the World Cycling Championships at Stuttgart, Germany, the next two weeks.

The track races, which began Tuesday at the Hanns-Martin-Schleyler Hall Velodrome, will feature Southland riders Janie Eickhoff of Los Alamitos in points and pursuit events, Steve Hegg of Dana Point in pursuits, and Maureen Manley of Thousand Oaks in the team time trial and road race.

Perhaps the most anticipated race will be in the women’s 3,000-meter match sprint with rivals Connie Paraskevin-Young of Indianapolis and Renee Duprel of La Mesa competing for the first time in a serious competition since last year’s championships at Japan.

In that race, Young won the gold, Duprel the silver. Duprel won U.S. National and U.S. Olympic Festival titles easily when Young passed on both events. Young said she was training solely to defend the World Championship title this year, and to prepare for the Olympics next year. Young is a four-time match sprint world champion.

Young, however, lost Tuesday to Sinett Wolke of Germany and must race in today’s repechage to advance. Duprel and 1988 Olympic champion Erika Salumiae of the Soviet Union had easy victories.

In the only final Tuesday, Jose Moreno of Spain won the men’s 1,000-meter time trial, with 1990 world champion Alexander Kirichenko of the Soviet Union fifth.

The five road races will begin in and around Stuttgart on Aug. 21 with a team time trial. The men’s and women’s amateur road races will be held Aug. 24 and the men’s professional road race, one of the championships’ premier events, is scheduled for Aug. 25.

Most of the top Tour de France finishers are entered in the one-day road race with Sean Kelly of Ireland and Greg LeMond of Wayzata, Minn., considered the favorites. LeMond, however, still is struggling after faltering in the mountain portion of last month’s Tour de France.

LeMond, seventh at the Tour, was 43rd in a 3.5-mile time trial Monday in the Tour of Holland.

But LeMond will have the advantage of a strong U.S. team supporting him--Andy Hampsten of Boulder, Colo., eighth in the Tour de France; Davis Phinney, also of Boulder, Mike Carter of New York and Greg Oravetz, who moved from Huntington Beach to Boulder four years ago.