The men’s team pursuit has taken on almost iconic status since events such as the Madison and individual pursuit were struck off the Olympic roster, but the women’s event is acquiring a prestige of its own at a remarkably rapid rate considering its recent inception.
It has been on the schedule only since 2008, and has existed in its current format – four women over four kilometres – only since 2013. On Friday evening here, the bronze medal won by the British women’s quartet was merely one element in a tournament marked by high-quality, high speed racing throughout the three rounds.
The gold went to the US with a string of times nudging up against the world record, implying that even if the British quartet of Elinor Barker, Ciara Horne, Joanna Rowsell Shand and Laura Trott had not imploded in their qualifier, they would have faced a stiff task in taking a seventh world title.
As it was, the Britons hit 4min 16sec in their victorious bronze ride-off against New Zealand and their second round ride against the Chinese, proving that even though this was their lowest placing since 2008, they are certainly well in the frame for Rio as long as they learn the lessons thrown up by Thursday evening’s struggle.
“We put in two pretty stunning rides there,” Rowsell-Shand said. “We went out for a 4.16 in qualifying but it didn’t pay off, even though for 3km we were in touch with the Americans. They’ve really raised the bar in this competition and we’ve got to follow that. We didn’t want to qualify second or third, we went out there to qualify fastest even if it didn’t pay off. We’ve learned a fair bit, we changed some things today, went for one-lap turns each, avoided starting too fast which is the golden rule in individual or team pursuiting.”
What impressed when the Britons came back on track against the Chinese was that they had visibly raised their game. Having looked on the limit in the qualifier, the second round ride was as smooth as could be expected, with barely a gap to be seen between the four bikes and not a single marginal change.
“As an elite athlete you have highs and lows and you have to be able to deal with that,” said Horne. “A friend of mine texted me and said it’s the sign of a true champion when you can pick yourself back up and go again, get stuck in and race, and that’s what we did.”
Rowsell Shand, for one, praised the switch to four riders over the same distance as the men, although it has made the event visibly more demanding, with teams falling to pieces in the final kilometre on a regular basis here.
“For women’s cycling and track cycling as a whole this event has been so good. People used to make jokes about women’s bunched races but they don’t any more. Teams have got to get five girls to world cups and it’s raised the whole standard of women’s cycling.”
