European Track Championships 2020: GB women’s team pursuit squad take gold as Elinor Barker takes elimination race title on second night 

The British women’s team pursuit squad were untouchable on the second night of the 2020 European Track Championships, taking a comfortable gold medal over the Italy. 

The UEC European Track Championships in Plovdiv in Bulgaria are the first major event of the 2020/21 track season, with the Olympics just a few months away. 

Katie Archibald, Neah Evans, Laura Kenny and Josie Knight celebrated a big win in the Euros on Thursday night (November 13), while Barker took another gold for the GB team in the elimination race. 

Ollie Wood also home a medal, securing the bronze in the men’s scratch race. 

Having qualified fastest the previous night with a 4-13.923, the women’s team pursuit unit faced Italy in the final, putting out a 4-10.437 to take gold with a time more than three seconds faster than their rivals. 

Laura Kenny said: “That’s the fastest time we’ve done since Rio, so that shows the form that we were in going into an Olympic year. It’s good to know we are still moving forward, Josie (Knight) is here for her first European competition and that shows the way British Cycling moves forward too. I personally think we’ve got a lot more to come, we’ve got people sat at home itching to get into this team and that can only help us move forward.”

Elinor Barker doubled up on gold medals with a victory in the elimination race, beating silver medallist Rachele Barbiere (Ita) and Portugal’s Maria Martins in third.  

Barker said: “I’m really happy with it. It went how I hoped it to, I expected it might be me and (Rachele) Barbieri the Italian rider at the end, and that went how I hoped it would. I rode it how I talked it through with my roommate Laura Kenny earlier today… and yeh, it worked!” 

Ollie Wood claimed the fifth medal for GB in this competition, taking bronze in the men’s scratch race, with Portugal’s Iuri Leitao taking gold. 

The GB women’s sprinters were also in action, but both Sophie Capewell and Katy Marchant didn’t make it past the quarter finals. 

>>> Making the impossible seem possible: Rohan Dennis’s coach explains how he turned the tides for Tao Geoghegan Hart at the Giro d’Italia  

 The event continues with the women’s individual pursuit and the men’s and women’s omniums.