Forty years after winning gold in Los Angeles, Connie Carpenter-Phinney watched nervously, hoping and praying that Kristen Faulkner could maintain her lead in the road race at the Paris Olympics.
When Faulkner succeeded, finishing her bold ride near the Eiffel Tower, Carpenter-Phinney was no longer the only American woman to win a road cycling gold medal.
“It was a beautiful finish,” Carpenter-Phinney told The Associated Press, “and I’m proud to have this company in this small and very special category of women Olympic road race champions.”
The result was a major surprise, as Faulkner was not initially set to race on Sunday.
The U.S. had only qualified two spots for the women’s road race in Paris. Chloe Dygert earned one spot by winning the world-time trial title, and Taylor Knibb secured the other by winning the U.S. time trial title.
However, when Knibb decided to focus on the triathlon, Faulkner became the clear choice to replace her. Faulkner was already headed to Paris to compete with Dygert in the team pursuit in the velodrome.
Her performance on the road this season had been impressive. Faulkner won Omloop van het Hageland, a top one-day road race in Belgium, and she captured a stage at La Vuelta Feminina, one of the major events in women’s cycling.
She also won the U.S. road race in May, although it didn’t automatically secure her a spot on the Olympic team.
“I made an agreement with my track coaches that I would only do the road race if I felt that I was medal-capable,” she said, “and if at any point I got dropped from the front group and was no longer in contention for a medal, I would pull out.”
That never happened. Faulkner stayed at the front throughout the race on Sunday, which started at the Trocadero, went into the French countryside, and then returned to Paris for three loops up the famous hill of Montmartre.
It seemed like Marianne Vos, the former Olympic champion and one of the greatest riders ever, might have outdone Kristen Faulkner when she teamed up with Blanka Vas for an attack.
The two worked together to create a large lead, forcing Faulkner to chase them, eventually joined by Belgium’s Lotte Kopecky.
Faulkner did most of the work to catch up with the leaders. So it was fitting that she—rather than the favored Kopecky—was the one who kept going when the four riders came together.
Faulkner attacked down the left side of the road while the others hesitated, trying to decide who would pursue her. By the time they decided, Faulkner was too far ahead for them to catch her.
“She needed to get rid of us,” Kopecky said. “She did what she had to do, but you also have to dare to do it.” Meanwhile, Carpenter-Phinney was eagerly waiting for Faulkner to join her as an Olympic champion.
There are similarities between them. Before 31-year-old Faulkner became an investment banker and started cycling in 2017, she had rowed for Harvard. Carpenter-Phinney had rowed for California, Berkeley.
“Kristen’s well-timed late-race move was perfect,” said Carpenter-Phinney, whose son and former Olympic cyclist Taylor Phinney was in the crowd in Paris, cheering for both the Americans and his wife, Polish rider Kasia Niewiadoma.
“I knew she was capable,” Carpenter-Phinney said. The cycling events at the Olympics have changed a lot since 1984. Back then, there were only eight gold medals, split between road and track, with the road race being the only event for women.
In Paris, there will be 22 gold medals across events like mountain biking, freestyle BMX, and BMX racing.
The American team has also changed. They were very successful 40 years ago, winning four of the eight gold medals and nine medals in total in Los Angeles. This included Alexi Grewal’s gold in the men’s road race and Rebecca Twigg’s silver in the women’s race.
