Eleven years after Jack Bobridge stunningly broke the individual pursuit world record, Conor Leahy has become the first Australian track cyclist to better the time.
Leahy registered a time of four minutes 10.113 seconds for the 4000m event in qualifying at Brisbane's Anna Meares Velodrome.
That gave him the Australian record, which Bobridge had held since his world record ride of 4:10.534 at the 2011 nationals.
It was a landmark ride by Bobridge, particularly given British great Chris Boardman had set the previous world record of 4:11.114 in 1996.
Bobridge in turn held the world mark until 2018, when American Ashton Lambie beat it by more than three seconds.
Lambie has since become the first man to go under four minutes for the pursuit, setting his latest world record of 3:59.930 last August.
While Leahy is a long way off challenging Lambie, the 22-year-old West Australian confirmed he is a rising star in track endurance by finally eclipsing Bobridge's record.
Leahy went on to beat South Australian and long-time friend Oliver Bleddyn in the final to win the pursuit gold medal.
"It's unreal, I've been hunting that record for a while," Leahy said.
"I've probably known I'm capable of it for two years, but things just hadn't lined up - I've had crashes, broken bones or just haven't had the best lead-in.
"There are some big races coming up, UCI Track Nations Cups and Commonwealth Games, which will be enormous if I get selected for that and there's an individual pursuit there.
"I hope this has put me in a good stead to get selection for that event and team and hopefully things just get faster and faster."
Meanwhile, South Australia successfully defended their women's team pursuit national crown with a championship record-setting time of 4:19.836.
Maeve Plouffe, Amber Pate, Chloe Moran and Alli Anderson caught and passed Queensland seven laps into the gold medal final and smashed their own 2018 mark of 4:27.450, set by Plouffe, Annette Edmondson, Alexandra Manly and Breanna Hargrave.
Queensland beat NSW to win the women's team sprint title.
