[Olympics] Rio de Janeiro 2016 - Page 53

Slovakian road cyclist Peter Sagan is perhaps the sport’s most beloved personality, an easygoing world champion with rock god hair who not long ago filmed a shot-for-shot remake of the final scene of the movie “Grease,” with his wife, Katarina, starring in Olivia Newton-John’s Sandy role, and Sagan playing John Travolta’s Danny Zuko, lip-syncing merrily to “You’re the One that I Want.”

You have to see it to believe it. It’s, to use the scientific term, amazeballs.

Sagan skipped the road race here at the Olympics—a race in which he very possibly could have contended for a gold medal. Instead, he will line up in Sunday’s mountain bike competition. Though Sagan raced mountain bikes as a teenager, and was once a junior world champ, he has not done it for seven years. It would be a sport-rattling upset if he wound up on the medal podium.

“No one knows what the hell to expect,” Sagan said Tuesday. “It’s funny, no?”

At first glance, a current road champ opting for a mountain bike race appears to be an odd choice. Brian Cookson, the president of the UCI, cycling’s governing body, said that Sagan “may be kicking himself a little bit” about missing the Rio road race, which was won by a racer, Greg Van Avermaet, whose skill set is not unlike Sagan’s.

But if you follow Sagan, you know that Peter Sagan doing the mountain bike race at the Olympics is the most Peter Sagan move possible. At 26, Sagan is the antithesis of a tightly-wound, hyper-regimented, goal-fixated cyclist. He comes across more like a California surfer looking for a perfect wave.

Choices like the Olympic mountain bike race are exactly what fans love about Sagan.

“This is completely on-brand for Sagan,” said John Bradley, editor-in-chief of the cycling publication Velonews. “You get the sense that during every road race he’s fighting the urge to just turn down some trail on the side of the road.”

Sagan’s decision for Rio was not made in haste. The Olympic mountain bike race has been a “big dream” for years, he said.

“I want to try,” he said. “I don’t expect anything big.”

In another quirky, Sagan-like move, Sagan didn’t train for the mountain bike race over in Europe with other Olympic-bound pros. After winning three stages at July’s Tour de France, he headed to Park City, Utah, where he trained at altitude, and jumped into low-key races with local riders. It was sort of like an NBA star showing up on the playground for 3-on-3.

“I was so stoked,” said Aaron Nydam, who raced against Sagan in a 50-kilometer race at the Grand Targhee Resort in Alta, Wyo. “He’s like the Michael Jordan of cycling.”

Sagan’s cameos in the Rockies had the region’s cycling scene buzzing. When rumors began circulating that Sagan might show up to the 50K endurance race at Grand Targhee, “we were blown away,” said local Adam Meyer.

“I’m going, ‘Am I really going to have the opportunity to stand at the starting line with Peter Sagan?’” said racer Jason Berning.

Sagan arrived at Grand Targhee without a fuss or entourage—just with Katarina; his friend, former expert level mountain biker/mogul skiier Steve Kwait, a Park City resident who has been pals with Sagan since his days on the Cannondale road team; and Kwait’s girlfriend, Christi Lloveras. Dressed in his neon yellow Tinkoff cycling team kit, and atop an orange Specialized bike, Sagan hit the line with a field that race director Andy Williams called “a pretty fast group of guys.”

Berning never expected to stay with Sagan for the entire race, but wondered how long he could hang on.

When the race began, he found out immediately.

“He was gone,” said Berning. “He was so powerful and fast. We never saw him again.”

“It’s a whole other level to what we are doing,” said Nydam.

Sagan wound up winning the race by 21 minutes over the second-place rider. Berning finished third. Nydam was fifth. Kwait claimed a decent result, too, though Sagan ribbed his friend. “He gave me a lot of trouble after I finished 45 minutes behind him,” Kwiat said. “But I still got second in my age group!”

Williams, the race director, said that Sagan was “very humble” after the race, telling Williams he didn’t want to stand on the podium and knock another rider off. But his competitors eagerly wanted him on the podium. Sagan complied, and stuck around for photos and autographs.

“Not many people can say they shared a podium with Peter Sagan,” said Nydam.

Soon afterward, Sagan surfaced at a Tuesday night “Midweek Mountain Bike” race in Solitude, Utah. “People were shocked,” said the race’s co-director, Brooke Howard.

Because Sagan is not ranked as a mountain biker and is expected to start the Olympic race toward the back, he wanted to practice moving up through the field. He started the race 30 seconds behind the pro-level riders, and soon blew through the entire group, picking off many riders on a steep climb.

“He went past them like they were standing still,” Howard said. “That was how they described his raw power.”

Sagan’s affection for America is clear—he’s planning to host a VIP cycling event for charity outside Los Angeles the third weekend of November. But his recent racing in the Rockies is not a blueprint what he can achieve in Rio. Here, he will face a stacked field that includes legendary champions like two-time gold medalist Julien Absalon of France and Switzerland’s Nino Schurter.

Sagan was quick to downplay any predictions.

“If I lose, I am not disappointed,” he said. “If I win, it’s so good. I’m here to give my best.”

Kwait wouldn’t rule out a great performance. “What’s inside that guy is unlike any athlete I’ve ever seen,” he said. “He could surprise all of us.”

“It’s going to be intriguing, isn’t it?” asked Cookson of the UCI.

Yup. Peter Sagan always is.