Benefield: Cyclist Tommy Lucas gets European seasoning (w/video)

Tommy Lucas’ future is not the only thing about him that’s shiny and bright.

His shaven legs gleam in the sunlight, but Lucas, a senior at Santa Rosa High School, says it is those shiny legs - and his heart - that are going to take him places in the world of cycling. So if you are his buddy, you can stop making snarky comments now.

“I’ve been shaving my legs since I was in seventh grade,” he said. “At first they were weirded out about it, but now that I’m a senior they are pretty used to it.”

Lucas and his legs have been busy.

Considered the top 17-year-old cyclist around, Lucas, who rides for Bear Development Team in Marin County, made two trips to Europe this summer with the USA Cycling junior national team, racking up race miles across Belgium and the Netherlands, as well as a stop in Canada.

“It’s a pretty big deal,” Lucas’ coach, Dave Latourette said. “They can pick any six kids they want. I don’t always think it’s always the best six kids, but if USA Cycling is willing to take a kid and invest in them and bring them to Europe, they see the upside and the potential.”

In Europe, the miles and the experience came, but the wins didn’t.

But don’t worry about Tommy Lucas. Latourette said Lucas has a maturity that belies his age. And a willingness to work and learn that is uncanny.

“You get your chance to ride, and ride at a very high level, and initially you go over and not race at the level that he is used to racing?” he said. “There are only two ways to go. You can either look at it and say ‘I’m motivated, I’m going to get better,’ or you can say ‘There’s no way I can make it, these guys are too good. I’m out.’”

“He learned a lot from that but he didn’t come away discouraged,” he said. “He came back and said, ‘I still want this. In fact, I want this more now.’?”

Lucas’s take on being a part of the blur that is a European peloton?

“The racing is 10 times faster and way more aggressive,” he said. “I couldn’t think of a better way to develop as a cyclist.”

Perspective. Lucas has it.

When he talks of his European adventures, he talks not of winning but of racing, and not of workouts and intervals, but of living. He’s a big-picture 17-year-old.

“The responsibilities are definitely higher,” he said of living with the strangers in dorm-style housing. “Over in Europe, you are in charge of how you present yourself. It’s your job to do your laundry, keep your bike clean and make sure you are on top of everything.”

When he was laid up with a vicious ear infection, his mom and stepdad were 5,500 miles away. Lucas managed it like someone balancing his duties and desires with his health.

“It definitely messed with my performance a little bit, but I still never missed a race and I raced through it,” he said. “I am definitely proud of the way I handled it.”

“They bring you over there just to race,” he said. “Your only job is to race. It would have killed me to not have raced.”

His desire to ride is so strong that the day after he made his transatlantic flight home from Europe, he showed up at the Giro di San Francisco, a 40-mile race through the streets of the city, and took third - among the pros.

Cycling suits Lucas, a student who carries a grade point average of about 3.5 despite missing stretches of school for his sport. He tends to train alone, but Latourette calls him incredibly coachable.

“You can sense he’s a confident kid, but he’s also a really respectful kid,” he said. “It’s his willingness to learn, his willingness to grow. He’s really receptive to coaching and doing it the right way.”

‘The right way’ in relation to cycling points the conversation straight to drugs and cheats and dopers who have marred the sport for what feels like forever. But even here, where it’s pretty easy to come out swinging, Lucas’ take is even, reasoned.

“Cycling is such a hard sport and they were all faced with such hard decisions,” he said. “I still look up to them, just hopefully when I’m given the chance to go pro I won’t make the same decision they did.”

Lucas sounds like a pro already.

You can reach staff columnist Kerry Benefield at 526-8671 or kerry.benefield@pressdemocrat.com and on Twitter @benefield