The second day of the 2024 UEC Track Elite European Championships saw a fantastic result for the men’s team pursuit, winning their first European title in nine years, while their female counterparts took a silver medal of their own.
Team pursuit
Great Britain’s first European title win of the night came from the men’s team pursuit squad of Dan Bigham, Ethan Hayter and Ethan Vernon, with Charlie Tanfield coming in for Ollie Wood who rode yesterday’s qualifying rounds. Taking on world champions Denmark in the gold medal race, Vernon set a strong pace which saw Great Britain taking consistent turns on the front to create a marginal lead of only a couple tenths of a second in the first few kilometres.
A closely fought race, the Brits controlled their pace as Vernon peeled off, leaving Bigham to take a long turn on the front. With 1km to go, Bigham increased the gap on the Danes to over a second, crossing the finish line in style as European champions for the first time in nine years.
After setting the fastest time of 4:12.866 in yesterday’s qualifying rounds, the women’s team pursuit squad started their gold medal ride off against Italy comfortably. The first 2km saw the lead consistently switch, with just hundredths of a second separating the teams.
However, with less than 2km to go, things started to unravel for the Brits as the Italians created a gap that the Brits struggled to hold. As the gap moved to over a second, a split formed within the British line up and unable to regroup, the squad of Meg Barker, Neah Evans, Josie Knight, Anna Morris and Jess Roberts would take the silver medal.
Men’s 1km time-trial
In a close-fought 1km time-trial event, Joe Truman started strongly, qualifying second fastest in 59.927 seconds as one of only two riders to go under a minute. As the penultimate rider in the evening’s final, Truman rode a consistent four laps, trailing on the lead rider by 0.095, putting him in third place. This meant he faced a nail biting wait to see if Italian Matteo Bianchi would back up his first ride, which he did, leaving Truman to take a valiant fourth place.
Men’s Madison
Ethan Hayter and Mark Stewart rode a controlled men’s Madison to finish in seventh place. After a steady start, the men’s Madison duo of Hayter and Stewart got stuck in to rack up the points in the first few sprints and sit comfortably in sixth place. With 110 laps to go, Hayter followed the wheel of the Danish rider to take three points and move up into fifth.
At the halfway point, Stewart and Hayter sat in sixth place on 10 points, while France, Germany and Denmark led in the medal positions.
Scottish rider Stewart followed the wheel of the Dutch rider to claim three more points and put them back in fifth place, before the Portuguese duo launched their attack and gained a lap to push the Brits down the standings.
Coming into the final quarter of the race, Stewart claimed three more points and pushed on with Belgium in an attempt to gain a lap, but with the Belgian rider unwilling to push, the duo was reeled back into the peloton.
Having already claimed a European title earlier in the night, Hayter went off the front in a last gasp attempt to gain a lap and a maximum 20 points, with the world champions the Netherlands and Czechia forming a gap, but were swiftly caught. The penultimate sprint saw the Brits gain two more points and move up to seventh, where they ultimately finished on 19 points.
Women’s scratch
A slow start in the women’s scratch race saw Sophie Lewis sit comfortably in the bunch, with the riders leaving it until the closing stages of the race to make the deciding moves.
A nervy last 10 laps saw the riders watching each other, pushing on before swinging up the track, with Lewis well in the mix, making efforts to increase the pace.
Lewis was sitting in the perfect position on the hip of the Lithuanian Olivija Baleisyte with three laps to go, but the penultimate lap saw her just start to go backwards, despite a fantastic out the saddle effort. The final lap saw Lewis lose a few positions, and realising she sprinted slightly too early, settled for 13th place.
Women’s sprint
The women’s individual sprint event kicked off with world champion Emma Finucane qualifying fastest in the flying 200m with a time of 10.432 seconds, while teammate Sophie Capewell was just behind in fourth place with 10.583.
Both riders made their way through the 1/16 and 1/8 rounds with ease, before heading into the evening’s quarter-finals. Finucane took on French rider Marie Divine Taky Kouame confidently, controlling the race throughout to take a 2-0 result which takes her into tomorrow’s semi-finals against France’s Mathilde Gros.
Capewell came up against Germany’s Emma Hinze in an incredibly tight race, taking the first round with a dramatic photo-finish, while Hinze blocked her opponent’s line to equalise. After a quick turnaround, the third leg saw Hinze quickly taking a lead with Capewell putting up a good fight to stay on her wheel over the line, but it wasn’t quite enough to pip the German and make it further in the competition.
On the second day of competition, Great Britain’s medal tally sits at one gold and three silver medals, putting them third in the overall medal table.
Tomorrow, on the third day of competition, you will be able to see Ethan Vernon compete in the men’s scratch race while Dan Bigham and Charlie Tanfield take on the individual pursuit. Emma Finucane will continue in the women’s sprint event and Neah Evans races the four-event omnium.
