{"id":909,"date":"2009-02-08T09:09:33","date_gmt":"2009-02-08T05:09:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.stokednews.com\/?p=909"},"modified":"2009-02-25T09:12:06","modified_gmt":"2009-02-25T05:12:06","slug":"cyclist-levi-leipheimer-is-more-than-a-monarch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.stokednews.com\/?p=909","title":{"rendered":"Cyclist Levi Leipheimer is more than a monarch"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-thumbnail wp-image-910\" title=\"levi\" src=\"http:\/\/www.stokednews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/\/2009\/02\/levi-100x100.jpg\" alt=\"levi\" width=\"100\" height=\"100\" \/><strong>SAN FRANCISCO<\/strong> \u00e2\u20ac\u201c Susan Gorin calls it a \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Levi sighting.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>The Santa Rosa mayor says she often hears reports from locals saying they had spotted professional cyclist Levi Leipheimer training on city roads.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Levi doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t just live here,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Gorin says proudly. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153He trains around here.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n<p>Another local, Gary Wysocky, first spotted the cyclist training along a stretch of Sonoma County road. Wysocky said he was able to interrupt Leipheimer for a 10-minute chat, which turned out to be a good-luck encounter: Leipheimer would eventually help him become a Santa Rosa lawmaker.<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u0153He endorsed me for City Council,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d said Wysocky. Asked if he had ever gone on a bike ride with Leipheimer, he chuckled. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153In my dreams,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d he said.<\/p>\n<p>That Leipheimer, a 12-year Santa Rosa resident, has become a hometown hero is of little surprise. After switching from competitive Alpine skiing to cycling at age 19, the humble 35-year-old climbing specialist grew into one of the world\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s best athletes, twice winning the Amgen Tour of California (tour officials are now calling him \u00e2\u20ac\u0153the King of California\u00e2\u20ac\u009d), becoming the fourth American in history to finish on the podium of the Tour de France (2007) and earning an Olympic bronze medal last year in Beijing, among a long list of impressive cycling accomplishments&#8230;.\u00c2\u00a0 <a href=\"http:\/\/www.sfexaminer.com\/local\/Levi-Leipheimer-is-more-than-a-monarch39239622.html\" target=\"_blank\">More info<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>SAN FRANCISCO \u00e2\u20ac\u201c Susan Gorin calls it a \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Levi sighting.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d The Santa Rosa mayor says she often hears reports from locals saying they had spotted professional cyclist Levi Leipheimer training on city roads. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Levi doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t just live here,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Gorin says proudly. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153He trains around here.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Another local, Gary Wysocky, first spotted the cyclist training along [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,41],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-909","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cycling","category-road-bike"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.stokednews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/909","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.stokednews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.stokednews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.stokednews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.stokednews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=909"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.stokednews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/909\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":911,"href":"http:\/\/www.stokednews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/909\/revisions\/911"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.stokednews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=909"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.stokednews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=909"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.stokednews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=909"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}