Family competition leads to national title for teen cyclist

What started off as a competition between family members has led Sarah Dressel to a national championship.

Dressel, 13, got started in cycling about three years ago and was urged on by her grandfather, George Fowlkes, a competitive cyclist.

When they started riding together she wanted to be able to beat her gradfather. Now she does that pretty regularly and last month she won the USA Cycling Junior Nationnal Track Cycling Championship for her age group in California.

Dressel, a Fort Mill resident, finished second in the scratch race, third in the points race and first in the 500-meter time trial in 39.3 second, to win the overall title. Riders from 10 states competed in her classification at the Carson, Ca. Indoor velodrome.

“She has really blossomed this year,” Fowlkes said.

Dressel said she got her inspiration to race by riding with Fowlkes and watching him race. That was three years ago. She has been competing for the past two years and rides in somewhere between 25 and 50 races a year.

Dressel trains at the Giordana Velodrome in Rock Hill four days a week for about 90 minutes each time with Steve Lehman, USAC Masters Champion.

“She works really hard,” he said. “She has really committed herself to it. She is as fast as any young girl I have worked with at that age.”

Dressel said she enjoys the sprinting aspect of the sport, but also enjoys the freeing feeling she gets from riding.

“You feel like this is the sport for you,” she said. “It makes you feel like, ‘yeah, this is what I want to do.’”

Besides training at the Velodrome in Rock Hill, she also goes on trailing rides on a road bike twice a week for about two and a half hours at a time.

“It’s a lot easier here (at the Velodrome) than on a road bike,” she said. “I am always ready to sprint here.”

Dressel is in the eighth grade and is home schooled by taking classes online, which allows her schedule to be more flexible when it comes to riding.

Although she hasn’t been competing long, she already has plans in store for herself.

“I want to try and go to the junior world championships and maybe the Olympics,” she said.

This story was originally published September 4, 2015 at 2:02 PM with the headline "Family competition leads to national title for teen cyclist."