Armstrong’s arbitration victory came on the heels of a three-year cycling break she took to recover from multiple hip surgeries.
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So when Armstrong, the last of the field to tackle the 29.7-kilometer course on a wild and wet day next to the Atlantic breakers, crossed the finish line five seconds quicker than Zabelinskaya had managed it felt fitting in so many ways.
“Did I win?” Armstrong (no relation to Lance) asked people around her, upon completing Wednesday’s race.
Armstrong’s first thought was, “What?”
After the race, she dropped off her bike and collapsed to the ground, exhausted.
But those notes drove her on, especially as they were written by US team mate Mara Abbott, whose failure to win a medal in Sunday’s road race when she was caught 200 metres from the line having led for the last 10km was sport at its most cruel. “The best answer I can give is that I can”, she told reporters on Wednesday. How she became the first cyclist to win the same event at three Olympics.
Olga Zabelinskaya of Russian Federation starts the women’s time trial on day five of the Rio 2016 Olympic Games at Pontal.
Armstrong’s fellow American, Evelyn Stevens, finished 10th in a time of 46:00.80.
Russia’s Olga Zabelinskaya protested her innocence after winning the silver medal in the women’s time trial, a week after nearly flying home because a previous doping ban looked like ruling her out of the Olympics.
Armstrong was met by her 5-year-old son Lucas at the finish line in Rio. And how Armstrong showed that you really can have it all: a family, a career, an Olympic legacy.
“I’m not the only cyclist that has a doping problem in the past”, said Zabelinskaya, who has always maintained her innocence. “Why am I crying? We cry when we’re happy'”.
Despite her advancing years the American saw no reason to stay away from Rio, and she was delighted to have made history by winning the women’s individual time trial for a third time. “It was two weeks like this”, she said. Her son was then lifted over the fence and he sprinted into her arms. “I love challenges in my life, and I haven’t found a challenge like [pursuing] a third gold medal”.
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She is the three-time national champion finished 8th in the women’s road race at summer Olympic in Athens.
Rain and heavy winds made an already hard track extremely challenging. She accepted an 18-month ban in February of this year, although by not competing it was deemed that she had already served her time and was free to resume competing.
“That was part of Kristin’s motivation today, is for her to come out and say, ‘yeah, I am the oldest”.
“Just take it because everyone else has to deal with this too”, she told herself.
Now Boise is celebrating her win. “And this morning, on my podium bag, there was another one”.
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“We’d hop on a military plane and compete in mainland Japan, Korea, Guam and the Philippines”, Armstrong said. I mean, that’s a great story.
