Carton disillusioned, angry

Press, 19 July 1983, Page 38

Carton disillusioned, angry

PA Wellington . A leading road cyclist, Stephen Carton, is disillusioned and angry after being dropped from the New Zealand 100 km time trial team for the world championships in Switzerland on August 31. Carton said his form in Sunday’s special ride in the Wairarapa was well below his best of last year, which included being a member of New Zealand’s bronze medal-winning 100 km team at the Brisbane Commonwealth Games and later

winning the Dulux seven day tour. But on the score of his wide experience since first being called in to the national 100 km squad in 1980, and there still being 6¥a weeks until the world event Carton believes he has been done an injustice. “I’ve been crook for a while since things went bad with my French club, and I came home,” said Carton. “I accept, too, that I didn’t really ride well enough to earn selection on that performance. “But the selectors know

what I can produce, and with all the experience I’ve built up I feel I’ve been kicked in the teeth. “They are going to be taking away three new blokes, Brian Fowler, Gary Johnson and Greg Fraine — I don’t see that it makes much sense.” Carton, who has been troubled by a virus, was distressed when the four riders: Fowler, Johnson, Fraine and Blair Stockwell, and the reserve, Jack Swart, were announced yesterday for Switzerland.