McCarthy Cycles to Victory on Coast-to-Coast Weekend

Mike McCarthy turned 24 on Saturday and was presented with something of a birthday gift by cycling promoter Danny Van Haute.

It was a check.

“Three hundred and five dollars,” McCarthy read aloud. “That’s pretty good for a California race.”

The check was for winning the pro-am Gaslamp Grand Prix criterium during a day of cycling and in-line skating on the streets of downtown. It was only one of two checks that McCarthy earned during the day and one of three he hopes to earn this weekend.

Earlier Saturday on the same six-turn Gaslamp Quarter course, McCarthy rode with the Portland Thunder of the National Cycle League and helped it finish first and set an NCL record for most points scored in a race with 186.

Later Saturday, McCarthy took a red-eye out of Lindbergh Field, spent a two-hour layover this morning at Chicago’s O’Hare and arrived back home in New York at 6:30 a.m. (PDT). This afternoon he will compete in the Harlem Criterium for a first-place check of $2,500, which is pretty good for a New York race.

“I don’t know why there’s such a disparity,” McCarthy said about prize money between the coasts. “The competition is just as good here. Maybe it’s that cycling has deeper roots in the East.”

McCarthy usually competes two or three times a week on the other coast, where it’s not unusual for riders to earn $1,000 in one weekend. But McCarthy insists he’s not pedaling for money. A credo in cycling says racing is the best training you can get, and McCarthy just tries to live by that.

“The more races, the better,” McCarthy said. “I hate to train, and the more I race, the less I have to train. I race out of necessity--it’s my job.”

McCarthy has already endured one layoff of sorts this year. He had been riding for the Montgomery-Subaru team, but his contract was not renewed this season. Had it been, McCarthy would be looking forward to competing in The Tour, as cyclists refer to it, or the Tour de France, as the rest of the world knows it.

“But they felt I was just too heavy to go over the mountains,” said McCarthy, who is 6 feet 1, 170 pounds. “And I’m not a good climber. I’m a little bit better for one-day races.

“But I would have liked the chance to prove them wrong, not that I harbor any animosity for them.”

McCarthy’s biggest successes have come on the velodrome. In 1988, he went to the Seoul Olympics in the team pursuit, then in 1990 he won bronze in the individual pursuit at the World Championships.

Ironically, it’s not the bronze medal that McCarthy looks back on now, but rather the ninth-place showing in the team pursuit at the ’88 Olympics.

“It was a turning point,” McCarthy said. “I learned I have a long way to go in this sport. Ninth place? What does that mean? It’s a zero result, so I changed my whole program around.”

It was fitting that McCarthy won the last race of the day because the previous race was won by one of his mentors.

In the Masters World Cup 40-49 criterium, Patrick Gellineau of New Jersey sneaked away from the field during the final lap and went on to an easy victory.

At one time, both McCarthy and Gellineau belonged to the Gold Coast Velo Club.

“I grew up learning from him,” McCarthy said of Gellineau, 40. “So it was good to see him do so well here, too. He’s such a savvy rider. I love to watch guys like that. He just knows how to maximize every (nuance) of a race to his benefit.”

In what turned out to be the best race of the day, Gellineau tucked into the field for most of the race and waited for other cyclists to catch breakaway rider Norman Kibble of Tucson. Kibble went out early with a three-rider break, but suddenly found himself alone as the other two dropped back.

“I had to decide, do I throw away all the energy I had expended to that point and drop back, or stay out there on the chance I could hang on and win the whole thing,” Kibble said.

He decided on the second option and was out on his own for 25 minutes before being absorbed by the field with six laps remaining.

With one lap to go, the field started breaking up. Several riders attacked, but instead of going all out, they kept looking over their shoulder to see what their competitors were doing.

“Everyone was very hesitant,” Gellineau said. “So I just decided to go for it. Since everybody was looking back, I got a three-, or four-second lead, and once you get out front, going through all those corners you can really go hard.”

It was Gellineau’s fourth Masters World Cup title.