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Another gold medal, another couple of world records. Joanna Rowsell, Dani King and Laura Trott won the first ever women’s team pursuit title at the Olympic Games with the most dominant performance seen at London’s velodrome so far.
In the closing stages of the 3,000-metre pursuit final, with the gold medals already in the bag, they had the United States in their sights.
And they hit the line in 3:14.051 to record their sixth successive world record ride.
Having qualified fastest by almost four seconds, it was perhaps not a surprise that the British team followed their male counterparts by winning.
But it was the manner of their performances that were so impressive.
In today’s first round they defeated Canada with another world record to set up the final against the USA, who had edged out the Australians by a tenth-of-a-second in a thrilling contest.
With just an hour to recover between the races, it seemed that another world record might be asking too much but after one kilometre coach Paul Manning tore up the script and the team did the rest.
Rowsell started fast to put them on course and then they rode intelligently to stay ahead of schedule. In previous rounds Trott had put in some huge turns but in the final they changed the lead more frequently, particularly in the closing stages, to stay on track for the world record.
Ever since the women’s team pursuit was introduced to the World Championship programme in 2008, Great Britain have consistently been at the forefront of giant leaps forward in performance.
And Rowsell, the 23-year-old from Sutton in Surrey, has been there every step of the way. As a 19-year-old she teamed up with Wendy Houvenaghel and Rebecca Romero to win the first world title. Their time in the final against Ukraine was 3-22.415.
In the four years since, Rowsell has been instrumental in slashing more than eight seconds off that time. Lizzie Armitstead, silver medallist in the road race last weekend, came into the team when Great Britain retained their world crown in 2009.
Australia denied them a third successive rainbow jersey in Copenhagen the following year but the emergence of Laura Trott and Dani King, and the coaching of former Olympic and world champion team pursuiter Manning has taken the British team to new heights.
Rowsell, Trott and King first broke the world record on the London track at the World Cup in February. They then lowered it in qualifying and the final at the World Championships in Melbourne in April. Now they have set three world records in two days to underline their superiority.
After Prince William and Kate, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, Prime Minister David Cameron, Lord Coe and a host of other famous faces Sir Paul McCartney was the latest celebrity to head to the velodrome, proving that it is the hottest ticket in town.
After the team pursuit medal ceremony, Sir Paul led the crowd in chorus of The Beatles song Hey Jude. It was an extraordinary moment – a member of the Fab Four leading the tributes to Britain’s Sensational Three.
Five of the gold medals on offer in the velodrome have now been decided and Great Britain have claimed four of them.
Jason Kenny got his challenge in the men’s sprint competition off to a flying start with a new Olympic record in the qualifying round. His time for the 200-metre flying lap was 9.713 seconds.
Shane Perkins of Australia was the first of the 17 riders to go under 10 seconds, Kenny then went quicker and waited to see what Grégory Baugé of France could do. Baugé’s time was slower – 9.952 seconds.
As there was an uneven number of qualifiers, Kenny enjoyed the luxury of a bye in the first knock-out round but observed the track tradition of taking the start line and rolling round to complete the formality and claim his place in the next round.
Baugé also had a walkover because his opponent, Zafeirios Volikakis of Greece heard an announcement in the velodrome and mistakenly thought he had not qualified for the next round.
Kenny defeated Bernard Esterhuizen comfortably to reach Sunday’s best- of-three quarter-final, where he will face the charismatic Malaysian Azizulhasni Awang, who fought his way through the repechage round.
Baugé will face another survivor from the repechage, Robert Forstemann of Germany. In the other matches Shane Perkins of Australia faces Jimmy Watkins of the United States and Nijsane Nicholas Phillip of Trinidad goes up against Russia’s Denis Dmitriev.
At the halfway stage of the men’s omnium, Great Britain’s Ed Clancy is in with a great chance of a medal.
He finished the first day in fourth place, on 17 points, just seven adrift of the leader Bryan Coquard of France.
Clancy, who secured a second successive Olympic gold medal in the team pursuit on Friday, is at his strongest in the timed events, as he demonstrated with a blistering victory in the flying lap.
To put his performance into perspective the final 200 metres of that lap were timed at 10.4 seconds, which would have been enough for fourth place in the individual sprint qualifying round held earlier in the day.
Clancy scrapped and battled in the 30-kilometre points race but missed a seven-rider split that got away to gain a lap. Another group got away later on. Roger Kluge of Germany won the race convincingly but the Dane Lasse Norman Hansen’s second place gave him the overall omnium lead.
Clancy fought for points to ensure he was the best of the rest but 11th place saw him slip to fourth.
The elimination race was a thrilling contest. Clancy may well have earned the nickname The Cat because he appeared to use up all his nine lives before finally bowing out fifth from last.
Clancy used a combination of cunning and guile to avoid elimination.
When he was unable to ride at the front and stay out of trouble he chose to drift a couple of lengths off the back and give himself a chance to take a run at the sprint, overtake a few riders and catch someone by surprise.
It worked several times and he survived a couple of wobbles – notably one coming together with the Italian Elia Viviani that looked like it might end badly – to score an excellent five points and keep himself in the medal hunt.
Coquard leads on ten points, with Viviani second on 13. Australia’s Glenn O’Shea, the current world champion, is third on 14 points.
Sunday brings the 4,000-metre individual pursuit, which offers Clancy a chance of another good result. The 15-kilometre scratch race is not as much of a problem to him as the points race and then the event concludes with his strongest discipline, the 1km time trial.
It could be that he faces the countdown for that event with a medal in sight.
The day belonged to the golden girls who kept Britain’s run of medals going and had pundits wondering whether a repeat of Beijing might yet be on the cards.
Results
Women's Team Pursuit
Finals
Gold Final
Great Britain 3:14.051 WR
United States 3:19.727
Bronze Final
Canada 3:17.915
Australia 3:18.096
Final 5th-6th
New Zealand 3:19.351
Netherlands 3:23.256
Final 7th-8th
Belarus 3:20.245
Germany 3:20.824
1st Round
Heat 1
Netherlands 3:20.013
Germany 3:21.086
Heat 2
New Zealand 3:18.514
Belarus 3:21.942
Heat 3
United States 3:16.853
Australia 3:16.935
Heat 4
Great Britain 3:14.682 WR
Canada 3:17.454
Progressing to gold medal final
Great Britain
United States
Progressing to bronze medal final
Canada
Australia
Men's Sprint
Final 9th - 12th
9 NAKAGAWA Seiichiro 10.95
10 KELEMEN Pavel -
11 ESTERHUIZEN Bernard -
12 CANELON Hersony
1/8 Finals Repechage
Heat 1
FORSTEMANN Robert Winner
KELEMEN Pavel Defeated
ESTERHUIZEN Bernard Defeated
Heat 2
AWANG Azizulhasni Winner
CANELON Hersony Defeated
NAKAGAWA Seiichiro Defeated
1/8 Finals
Heat 1
KENNY Jason Winner
ESTERHUIZEN Bernard Defeated
Heat 2
BAUGE Gregory Winner
NAKAGAWA Seiichiro Defeated
Heat 3
PERKINS Shane Winner
CANELON Hersony REL
Heat 4
PHILLIP Njisane Nicholas Winner
FORSTEMANN Robert Defeated
Heat 5
DMITRIEV Denis Winner
AWANG Azizulhasni Defeated
Heat 6
WATKINS Jimmy Winner
KELEMEN Pavel Defeated
1/16 Finals - Repechage
Heat 1
CANELON Hersony Winner
DAWKINS Edward Defeated
Heat 2
NAKAGAWA Seiichiro Winner
ZIELINSKI Damian Defeated
Heat 3
ESTERHUIZEN Bernard Winner
MAZQUIARAN URIA Hodei Defeated
ZHANG Miao Defeated
1/16 Finals
Heat 1
KENNY Jason Winner
Heat 2
BAUGE Gregory Winner
VOLIKAKIS Zafeirios DSQ
Heat 3
PERKINS Shane Winner
MAZQUIARAN URIA Hodei Defeated
Heat 4
FORSTEMANN Robert Winner
ESTERHUIZEN Bernard Defeated
Heat 5
DMITRIEV Denis Winner
ZIELINSKI Damian Defeated
Heat 6
KELEMEN Pavel Winner
CANELON Hersony Defeated
Heat 7
WATKINS Jimmy Winner
NAKAGAWA Seiichiro Defeated
Heat 8
AWANG Azizulhasni Winner
ZHANG Miao Defeated
Heat 9
PHILLIP Njisane Nicholas Winner
DAWKINS Edward Defeated
200m TT qualifying
1 KENNY Jason 9.713 OR
2 BAUGE Gregory 9.952
3 PERKINS Shane 9.987
4 FORSTEMANN Robert 10.072
5 DMITRIEV Denis 10.088
6 CANELON Hersony 10.123
7 NAKAGAWA Seiichiro 10.144
8 ZHANG Miao 10.155
9 DAWKINS Edward 10.201
10 PHILLIP Njisane Nicholas 10.202
11 AWANG Azizulhasni 10.226
12 WATKINS Jimmy 10.247
13 KELEMEN Pavel 10.311
14 ZIELINSKI Damian 10.323
15 ESTERHUIZEN Bernard 10.35
16 MAZQUIARAN URIA Hodei 10.604
17 VOLIKAKIS Zafeirios 10.663
Men's Omnium
Round 3 - Elimination Race
1 COQUARD Bryan 1 pts
2 VIVIANI Elia 2 pts
3 O'SHEA Glenn 3 pts
4 PEREZ Walter Fernando 4 pts
5 CLANCY Edward 5 pts
6 ARCHBOLD Shane 6 pts
7 KLUGE Roger 7 pts
8 LEA Bobby 8 pts
9 CHO Hosung 9 pts
10 BELL Zachary 10 pts
11 CHOI Ki Ho 11 pts
12 HANSEN Lasse Norman 12 pts
13 ARANGO CARVAJAL Juan Esteban 13 pts
14 LINAREZ ZAMBRANO Carlos Daniel 14 pts
15 IRVINE Martyn 15 pts
16 MANSILLA Luis 16 pts
17 TERUEL ROVIRA Eloy 17 pts
18 van HOECKE Gijs 18 pts
Overall standing after round 3
1 COQUARD Bryan 10 pts
2 VIVIANI Elia 13 pts
3 O'SHEA Glenn 14 pts
4 CLANCY Edward 17 pts
5 HANSEN Lasse Norman 18 pts
6 KLUGE Roger 19 pts
7 ARCHBOLD Shane 23 pts
8 PEREZ Walter Fernando 28 pts
9 BELL Zachary 30 pts
10 IRVINE Martyn 30 pts
11 LEA Bobby 30 pts
12 CHO Hosung 31 pts
13 TERUEL ROVIRA Eloy 34 pts
14 ARANGO CARVAJAL Juan Esteban 38 pts
15 van HOECKE Gijs 40 pts
16 CHOI Ki Ho 40 pts
17 LINAREZ ZAMBRANO Carlos Daniel 46 pts
18 MANSILLA Luis 52 pts
Round 2 - Points Race 3km
1 KLUGE Roger 79 pts
2 HANSEN Lasse Norman 59 pts
3 TERUEL ROVIRA Eloy 55 pts
4 COQUARD Bryan 51 pts
5 VIVIANI Elia 47 pts
6 IRVINE Martyn 47 pts
7 PEREZ Walter Fernando 26 pts
8 O'SHEA Glenn 25 pts
9 van HOECKE Gijs 23 pts
10 CHO Hosung 20 pts
11 CLANCY Edward 18 pts
12 LEA Bobby 8 pts
13 BELL Zachary 4 pts
14 ARCHBOLD Shane 3 pts
15 CHOI Ki Ho 3 pts
16 ARANGO CARVAJAL Juan Esteban -18 pts
17 LINAREZ ZAMBRANO Carlos Daniel -18 pts
18 MANSILLA Luis -40 pts
Overall standings after round 2
1 HANSEN Lasse Norman 6 pts
2 COQUARD Bryan 9 pts
3 O'SHEA Glenn 11 pts
4 VIVIANI Elia 11 pts
5 CLANCY Edward 12 pts
6 KLUGE Roger 12 pts
7 IRVINE Martyn 15 pts
8 ARCHBOLD Shane 17 pts
9 TERUEL ROVIRA Eloy 17 pts
10 BELL Zachary 20 pts
11 LEA Bobby 22 pts
12 CHO Hosung 22 pts
13 van HOECKE Gijs 22 pts
14 PEREZ Walter Fernando 24 pts
15 ARANGO CARVAJAL Juan Esteban 25 pts
16 CHOI Ki Ho 29 pts
17 LINAREZ ZAMBRANO Carlos Daniel 32 pts
18 MANSILLA Luis 36 pts
Round 1 - 250m Flying Lap
1 CLANCY Edward 12.556
2 ARCHBOLD Shane 13.112
3 O'SHEA Glenn 13.222
4 HANSEN Lasse Norman 13.236
5 COQUARD Bryan 13.347
6 VIVIANI Elia 13.359
7 BELL Zachary 13.406
8 ARANGO CARVAJAL Juan Esteban 13.469
9 IRVINE Martyn 13.504
10 LEA Bobby 13.559
11 KLUGE Roger 13.571
12 CHO Hosung 13.614
13 van HOECKE Gijs 13.633
14 TERUEL ROVIRA Eloy 13.655
15 CHOI Ki Ho 13.659
16 LINAREZ ZAMBRANO Carlos Daniel 13.863
17 PEREZ Walter Fernando 14.036
18 MANSILLA Luis 14.27
Standings after round 1
1 CLANCY Edward 1 pts
2 ARCHBOLD Shane 2 pts
3 O'SHEA Glenn 3 pts
4 HANSEN Lasse Norman 4 pts
5 COQUARD Bryan 5 pts
6 VIVIANI Elia 6 pts
7 BELL Zachary 7 pts
8 ARANGO CARVAJAL Juan Esteban 8 pts
9 IRVINE Martyn 9 pts
10 LEA Bobby 10 pts
11 KLUGE Roger 11 pts
12 CHO Hosung 12 pts
13 van HOECKE Gijs 13 pts
14 TERUEL ROVIRA Eloy 14 pts
15 CHOI Ki Ho 15 pts
16 LINAREZ ZAMBRANO Carlos Daniel 16 pts
17 PEREZ Walter Fernando 17 pts
18 MANSILLA Luis 18 pts
Start lists
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