Mounter after Pan-Am gold

LOCAL CYCLING is about to find out if it already has Barry Forde’s replacement.
Highly touted track rider Javed Mounter heads a team of two local cyclists into South America looking for Bajan glory at this week’s Pan American Cycling Championships in Argentina. 
“I am looking to bring back gold in the keirin,” said Mounter in a recent telephone interview with SUNSPORT.
“Right now the way I am training and have been riding, I am very confident of getting a medal in that race.”
If Mounter is indeed successful, he will be just the first Barbadian to ever medal in that event following former gold medallist Forde, who copped silver last year in Mexico.
Forde was the lone medallist on that 2010 team, which also included Mounter as an 18-year-old debutant.
Despite failing to finish atop the podium, Mounter still set new national marks in both the sprint and kilo events. This after Darren Matthews and Shane Weekes also turned in credible performances.
But this year’s team will be without Weekes, Matthews and the now retired Forde, leaving the likes of impressive juniors Jamol Eastmond and Mounter to pick up the slack in their absence.
“It was a totally different track for me and a whole new level of competition so I didn’t adjust,” admitted Mounter of last year’s meet.
“This year I am ready to bring back a medal.”Mounter is also slated to contest the kilo and match sprint, while Eastmond will be competing in the points and scratch races along with the road race.
Forde was recently forced to retire in the face of a life ban after failing his third drug test when he was found positive for taking EPO earlier this month.
The team, which is being coached and managed by Mark Grannum, left for Argentina on Friday.