World champion Kate Courtney leads the finalists for the U.S. Olympic cycling team across the road, track and mountain events.
USA Cycling named its “long team” on Thursday in a live streamed announcement on its YouTube page featuring actor Patrick Dempsey and NBC Sports anchor Steve Schlanger. Most of the cyclists will ultimately make the Tokyo Olympic roster. The rest will be alternates. Nobody outside of the long team can go to the Olympics, according to USA Cycling.
The long team features world champions in Courtney, Chloe Dygert (the lone cyclist among the finalists who previously clinched an Olympic spot), Amber Neben, Jennifer Valente, Emma White and Lily Williams.
Courtney won the 2018 World title in mountain bike and eyes the first U.S. Olympic title in the discipline that debuted at the 1996 Atlanta Games. Dygert is a reigning world champion on the road and the track. Valente, White and Williams joined Dygert on a team pursuit squad that won a world title on Feb. 27. Neben won world road time trial titles in 2008 and 2016.
The men on the long team are led by Tour de France veteran Tejay van Garderen.
Van Garderen placed fifth in the Tour de France in 2012 and 2014, the best finish for an American at the three-week stage race since 2008. Van Garderen also has the top Tour de France finish for an American in this Olympic cycle -- 32nd in 2018.
Van Garderen withdrew from Rio Olympic consideration due to Zika virus concerns four years ago, when his wife was pregnant with their second child,
The full Olympic long team for road, track and mountain events:
Road
Chloe Dygert
Krista Dobel-Hickock
Katharine Hall
Amber Neben
Coryn Rivera
Lauren Stephens
Leah Thomas
Taylor Wiles
Ruth Winder
Lawson Craddock
Ian Garrison
Alex Howes
Sepp Kuss
Brandon McNulty
Neilson Powless
Tejay van Garderen
Track
Christina Birch
Chloe Dygert
Maddie Godby
Megan Jastrab
Mandy Marquardt
Kendall Ryan
Jennifer Valente
Emma White
Lily Williams
Adrian Hegyvary
Daniel Holloway
Gavin Hoover
Mountain
Haley Batten
Kate Courtney
Lea Davison
Hannah Finchamp
Erin Huck
Chloe Woodruff
Christopher Blevins
Keegan Swenson
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MORE: Chloe Dygert wanted to be Prefontaine. Then Bird. Now, her coach.
