Two golds for Great Britain at junior track worlds

Emily Nelson, Junior track world championships

Great Britain's riders bounced back on day two of the junior track world championships winning gold in the women's team pursuit and 500m time trial.

Riding the new four kilometre format team pursuit the junior women set two national records on their way to gold. Hayley Jones, Amy Hill, Emily Nelson and Emily Kay convincingly beat Russia in the gold final with a time of 4:36.147 minutes. They now hold the British national record (not the world record as we initially reported) as Britain's senior national squad is yet to ride the new distance in competition.

The time was mistakenly reported as a world record, but in fact it is not, it is a junior record. At the under-23 European championships in Portugal in June the Russian team set a mark of 4:34.999 as they won gold. This time is still to be confirmed by the UCI as a world record, until then it is a worlds best.

The British quartet rode a technically superb race in qualifying considering the extra kilometre and having to swing higher up the track in their changes with an extra rider in the line. Australia, who qualified fourth fastest after losing a rider to a crash, came back to beat GB's time (a junior record) in their bronze final, but GB went faster again to take gold.

"I was giving it everything I've got, especially on my last turn," said Hayley Jones afterwards. "I was trying to leave it all on the track. We were hoping [to beat the record] but then to beat it again by over two-and-a-half seconds was a lot."

Before their ride Dannielle Khan had won Britain's first gold in the 500m time trial. Her time of 35.456 was a personal best by sixth tenths of a second and put her almost half-a-second clear of second placed Melissandre Pain (Fra). "I don't think it will sink in for a while." She said after receiving her rainbow jersey and gold medal. "Seeing Becky James take two world titles just a few months ago was so inspirational, I never would have thought it would happen to me. I'm so happy."

The British team has produced several junior world champions in sprint disciplines since Jason Kenny won double gold in Ghent in 2002, but Khan is the only sprinter competing for GB this year. With the rest of the GB sprint program made up of predominantly first year juniors, British Cycling's coaching staff decided not to bring them to this year's world championships, and instead continue their development. Khan will contest both the sprint and the kern over the next three days.

Matt Gibson narrowly missed out on a medal in the individual pursuit when he was beaten by Russian Pavel Chursin in the bronze medal final. Gibson set a PB in qualifying of 3:22.386 minutes in the third of 22 heats. His time put him at the top of the leaderboard for much of the qualifying session but eventually three riders overhauled him. Tao Geoghagen Hart qualified in 24th position with a 3:30.225 ride.

The top two positions were taken by Australian riders. In the final Zachary Shaw (3:21.122) beat Callum Scotson (3:24.132) to take the nations fourth gold medal of the championships.

Germain Burton crashed out of the scratch race qualification round in the morning sustaining heavy abrasions on his right side. Germany's Manuel Porzner won the event that evening with a perfectly timed attack that saw him lap the field.

Russian riders controlled the men's keirin final as two of their riders made it through the rounds to the final. Sergej Gorlov won gold, riding away from the others soon after the kern swung off. With Czech rider Jaroslav Snasel looking over his shoulder at Alexander Dubchenko (Rus), Gorlov was given too much space. Snasel was the fastest finisher, but had left himself too much distance to make up and had to settle for silver. Dubchenko took bronze.

NB: This story was updated at 14:06hrs on Friday August 9

Emily Kay, the team captain, celebrates setting a new national record

A stunned Germain Burton deals with the pain after a painful crash in the scratch race

Related links

Great Britain fourth in junior men's team pursuit

Gallery: Day one at junior track worlds

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Simon Richardson
Magazine editor

Editor of Cycling Weekly magazine, Simon has been working at the title since 2001. He fell in love with cycling 1989 when watching the Tour de France on Channel 4, started racing in 1995 and in 2000 he spent one season racing in Belgium. During his time at CW (and Cycle Sport magazine) he has written product reviews, fitness features, pro interviews, race coverage and news. He has covered the Tour de France more times than he can remember along with two Olympic Games and many other international and UK domestic races. He became the 130-year-old magazine's 13th editor in 2015.