The Boulder native admits, even he was a little surprised to be at Scratch Labs in Boulder talking to the press about racing in the upcoming 2012 summer games.

"It's a step I eventually wanted to take and just had to take," Phinney said. "It was a little sooner than I had anticipated."

After 2008, the cycling track event he just raced in was removed from the Olympics, so Taylor hit the road and started stretching his bike abilities and becoming a road race cyclist.

"I have had to change focus," Phinney said.

He just won two stages of the Tour De Italy and now finds himself riding along the Boulder highways he grew up on training for Olympic competition.

He didn't expect to compete in the Olympics until 2016, after the US cycling selection committee named him to the team.

"In a way I was not expecting but hoping I would get the call, and I did," Phinney said.
Not that anyone should be surprised, because when it comes to cycling Taylor was born to ride.

His mother Connie Carpenter and father Davis Phinney both won Olympic cycling medals in the 1984 Summer Games.

"As parents who have won Olympic medals to have your child in pursuit of Olympic medals, much less actually get one, is pretty phenomenal," Carpenter said.

Now Taylor's looking to head to London and manage the distractions he faced in Beijing.

"I think the biggest distraction for me was a having the US Women's gymnastics team staying above me," Phinney said.

 

(KUSA-TV © 2012 Multimedia Holdings Corporation)