Ashton Lambie comes across as a relaxed and sort of hipster-ish kind of guy, with a handlebar moustache and a country-folk vibe about him. The Nebraska-born track cyclist, who recently broke the world record in the Individual Pursuit, also has an exacting edge; a need to be meticulous, on-target and perfect. His attention to detail comes from his background in music: a pianist whose precision while playing the keys with his fingertips has somehow translated into pedalling on the track with his legs.
Lambie comes from a close-knit family. He has a history of gravel biking and lives with his wife Margaret on the outskirts of Lincoln, in Nebraska – also known as The Beef State – and a place he admits is a little more farm and a little less city. His dad is a landscaper, and his mom is a loan officer for a local real estate firm.
"We're not cattle ranchers or anything like that," Lambie says, mainly in response to the rumours circulating about him being plucked from a cornfield and put on a track bike. The tales started after Lambie broke the world record in the Individual Pursuit (4km) in 4:07.25 at the Pan American Championships in Aguascalientes, Mexico, in August. He shattered the existing record set by Australia's Jack Bobridge in 2011 by more than three seconds. In doing so, he gained international press attention, in part because he was an unknown in the world of cycling.
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"Most people come to track racing from the road, racing under-23s in Europe, and we already know their names," says Lambie, who has a history of long-distance gravel racing. "For someone to come out of gravel, which isn’t as popular, and to break a world record that people have had their eye on for a while, people were surprised.”
It's true that Lambie is relatively new to track cycling, having started racing the Individual Pursuit at the US Track National Championships last year. But the press, and his peers, have focussed on his Nebraskan lifestyle and a job he temporarily had at a bike shop in Kansas while his wife Margaret attended Kansas University.
He has even been going by the new nickname 'Cornfed', affectionately given to him by his teammates on the US national team.
World-record precision on the track
You can read more at Cyclingnews.com
via Cyclingnews Latest Interviews and Features http://www.cyclingnews.com/features/ashton-lambie-the-pursuit
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