Only half of the calendar for 2023 had ticked away before Owen Cole (Velocious Sport) earned a huge haul of firsts, which were punctuated, so far, with an inaugural appearance at the UCI Road World Championships for Team USA. In fact, he’ll get his first trip to Europe courtesy of the berth on the U23 roster of seven men for time trial and road race events in Glasgow.
The stars-and-stripes jersey he earned in June at USA Cycling Amateur Road Nationals in Roanoke, Virginia was his first major road win. Just one month before in Albuquerque, New Mexico, he won his first national title, taking the crown in the USA Cycling Collegiate road race for club teams.
The 19-year-old from Chapel Hill, North Carolina rides for club team Velocious Sport as well as for his collegiate club team with the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill (UNC). Last year as a freshman at UNC, he joined the cycling club team and focused on mountain biking in the Carolina colours, winning six events across cross-country, short track XC, downhill, and the marathon MTB national title.
After a collegiate road title this year, it was the U23 victory in Roanoke that presented a springboard to greater challenges on the road, rather than his first love for mountain biking. He called the moments after realising he qualified for Worlds as ‘surreal’. Cyclingnews caught up with Cole before he headed to Europe for his first taste of kermesse racing and then training with Team USA to prepare for the World Championships.
Cyclingnews: How did you become interested in riding a bicycle?
Owen Cole: My dad has always ridden bikes. Back in the 90s, when mountain biking started to become a ’thing’, he was riding his road bike on mountain bike trails. And he’s had me mountain biking kind of my whole life. It was just like a weekend recreation thing, that you do every once in a while, and then the NICA league started in North Carolina, in 2017. I started doing that and got into racing mountain bikes. And I realized that it was really fun. Until late spring, early summer of last year, it was entirely mountain biking that I did.
I travelled a decent amount around the US and did some of the big mountain bike races and I liked it. But I always had this interest in the road. I got the opportunity to try it out and do a little more of it when US road nationals came to Roanoke last year. I had a good time and got second in the crit. And that was when I was like, ‘Yeah, this is really fun’. So that…
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