Team Pursuit Quartet Make History

It was same old, same old as the Great British Team Pursuit squad left the gate at the start of the Olympic Team Pursuit qualification today in the Laoshan Velodrome, Beijing as Geraint Thomas, Ed Clancy, Paul Manning and Bradley Wiggins dominated the times with a 3m 57.101s in Qualification, easily faster than New Zealand's 3m 59.277s

The quartet made the time look effortless as they stormed round the track in exactly the schedule coach Shane Sutton was setting out for them on the Pursuit line, whereas the other teams had to go into the red to achieve their qualification times and get within five seconds of the World Champions

Perhaps surprisingly, World Championship Silver medallists Denmark didn't break four minutes, clocking 4m 02.191s and the Aussies only just managed faster with 4m 02.041s

Round One saw GB line up against the Russian team, who to be honest, with a qualification time of 4m 06.518s weren't going to pose a threat the the unstoppable British team

Nevertheless Sutton scheduled the team to a new World Record time of 3m 55.205s, with again Wiggins, Manning, Clancy and Thomas taking everything in their stride and making World Records look effortless

Denmark were back on form to beat France in the third fastest time ever with a 3m 56.831s to set up a rematch of the final back in Manchester only four months ago

The Bronze medal ride off will feature the Australian's who caught the Netherlands and set a time of 3m 58.633s, they will now face New Zealand who set 3m 57.536s, catching Spain along the way



Monday morning saw the finals of the Team Pursuit take placed to yet another sell-out crowd at the Laoshan Velodrome with New Zealand facing Australia in the Bronze medal ride off and Great Britain going for Gold against Denmark in a repeat of the World Championship final from Manchester earlier this year

In the battle for Bronze New Zealand never looked like losing as they opened up with a 1m 03.5s Kilo, maintaining this pace throughout to take the medal in 3m 57

Next came the event that British Cycling has been waiting for, for the last eight years, since the British quartet from the Sydney Olympics in 2000 set an Olympic Record on their way to Bronze, then the Aussie team produced a stunning World Record to again deny GB Gold in Athens, forcing them to settle for Silver

However now, 2008 the stage was set for Britain to make history and finally become Olympic Team Pursuit Champions, and that they did in true British style with another fantastic performance, making World Record breaking look like childs play they set an amazing time of 3m 53s, knocking another two seconds off their time!



Afterwards the team spoke to the BBC and commented:

Ed Clancy:  Any Nerves?  "As always, but we knew we were the best team out here. It was far from a formability but we knew we should win this and we had to go out and put them away and although we didn’t see that time coming, it was pretty special.”

Paul Manning: “This was the pinnacle really. We have world titles several times but this is really satisfying to go out on such a high. G enjoys going faster, but we needed to make sure we won the medal and these four guys are fantastic. It's like a family”   

Bradley Wiggins. “This is phenomenal. I wasn’t my usual self yesterday after the IP. I was really disappointed to feel like because I didn’t want to let these guys down. I was on the back foot yesterday and didn’t want to let them down because I know how much these guys have sacrificed for this one event and they are happy for me to go off and do my individual stuff. G could potentially have won a medal in the individual and if we had both done it, we may not have made it to the final.”

“To be part of this team is fantastic. We have come a long way in four years. To put that into perspective, that time is 11 seconds faster than the record we set in Sydney in 2000 and 11 seconds is long way in the team pursuit.”  On his second Gold medal, he says “I set out to do that, I believed I could do that, but to actually do it is another thing and it is such a relief when you finally do it.”

Men's 4km Team Pursuit

Final Results

1. Great Britain

2. Denmark

3. New Zealand

4. Australia

Round One

1. Great Britain  1:03.308(1) 2:00.624(1) 2:57.664(1) 3:55.205  61.223 WR
2. Russian Fed.  1:04.800(2) 2:04.130(2) 3:04.885(2)   caught

1. Denmark  1:03.358(1) 2:00.650(1) 2:58.814(1) 3:56.831  60.802 
2. France  1:04.683(2) 2:03.659(2) 3:03.588(2) 4:09.588   caught

1. Australia  1:03.337(1) 2:00.903(1) 2:58.834(1) 3:58.633  60.343 
2. Netherlands  1:03.957(2) 2:02.925(2) 3:03.034(2)  Caught

1. New Zealand  1:03.737(1) 2:01.169(1) 2:58.357(1) 3:57.536  60.622 
2. Spain  1:06.576(2) 2:06.112(2)    caught

Qualification Results

 1.  Great Britain 1:03.663(2) 2:01.370(1) 2:59.107(1) 3:57.101  60.733 

      Ed Clancy, Paul Manning, Geraint Thomas, Bradley Wiggins  

 2.  New Zealand 1:03.395(1) 2:01.725(2) 3:00.192(2) 3:59.277  60.181 
 3.  Australia 1:04.323(4) 2:02.539(3) 3:02.091(3) 4:02.041  59.494 
 4.  Denmark 1:04.568(5) 2:03.146(4) 3:02.305(4) 4:02.191  59.457 
 5.  France 1:05.526(7) 2:04.819(6) 3:04.037(6) 4:03.679  59.094 
 6.  Netherlands 1:03.923(3) 2:03.227(5) 3:03.159(5) 4:04.806  58.822 
 7.  Spain 1:06.752(10) 2:06.056(9) 3:05.898(9) 4:06.509  58.415 
 8.  Russian Fed. 1:05.508(6) 2:04.853(7) 3:04.751(7) 4:06.518  58.413 
 9.  Ukraine 1:05.884(8) 2:05.498(8) 3:05.812(8) 4:07.883  58.091 
10. Colombia 1:06.686(9) 2:06.769(10) 3:08.642(10) 4:11.397  57.279 

Full Results