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Rebecca Twigg (born March 26, 1963) is an American female cycle racer, who won six World Track Cycling Championship titles in the Individual Pursuit. During her cycling career, she also won 16 U.S. National Championship titles (the first of which - in the Individual Time Trial - took place when she was just 18 years old) and two Olympic medals (Silver medal in the 1984 Road Race in Los Angeles, and Bronze medal in the 1992 Track Pursuit in Barcelona).

Twigg also made her mark in road stage races. In 1984-86, she won the first three editions of the Women's Challenge.

Twigg was a three-time Olympian (1984, 1992, and 1996). However, her final Olympic appearance, in Atlanta in 1996, ended in controversy when she quit the team in a disagreement with the team coach Chris Carmichael and the U.S. Cycling Federation. The national federation had invested heavily in the development of the so-called "SuperBike". Twigg, after using the bike in an earlier portion of the Games, subsequently refused to ride it, citing poor individual fit and claiming that pressure from the staff on her to use the SuperBike and their refusal to grant formal accreditation to her longtime personal coach, Eddie Borysewicz, left her defocused.

[edit] External link

• Washington Post article on the controversy at the 1996 Olympic Games