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Local cyclist makes U.S. team again COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. � Jacksonville�s Steve Larsen has been selected to the 2000 U.S. world mountain bike championship team for the second consecutive year. The World Mountain Bike Championships will be held June 7-11 in Sierra Nevada, Spain. The 30-year-old Larsen is also a member of the 2000 U.S. Olympic long team, which places him as one of the top candidates for the official Olympic mountian bike team for Sydney, Australia. Larsen, rated 48th in the Union Cycliste Internationale world rankings, started riding at 14 and eventually became a professional road racer for Motorola. He switched to mountain-bike racing in 1995. Larsen, who is the only U.S. cyclist to compete in four world championship disciplines (road, track, cyclo-cross and mountain bike), has had great success in the 2000 season. He finished third overall at the Chevy Trucks NORBA National Championship Series cross-country race in Snow Summit, Calif., and was 10th in the Olympic long team mountain bike qualifying event in Goodyear, Ariz. Last season, Larsen won a gold medal at the Pan American Games in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, and took second overall at the Chevy Trucks National Championship Series in Welch Village, Minn. He also finished sixth overall in the SuperCup Cyclo-Cross Series. Larsen was the short-track cross-country champion and in 1997 claimed the national cross-country championship. In his career, Larsen has claimed six cross-country titles and one short-track cross-country win. Obituaries | Sports | Business | Classifieds | Tempo | Prime Times | So Oregon Sites | Outdoor Journal | Subscribe | Contact | Movies | Advertise | Real Estate Showcase | Archive | Editorials | Letters to the editor | Religion | Wake-up Call | NIE | Cyber Chef | Job Network | So Oregon Weather | WSJ Northwest | Forums | AP Wire | AP Money | F.A.Q. | Awards Ottaway Newspapers, Inc. The Community Newspaper Subsidiary of Dow Jones & Co, Inc Copyright �The Mail Tribune 2000, Medford, Oregon USA