Cycling: England crush Aussies to clinch gold

Mar 18 2006

By The Evening Chronicle

England stormed to victory over Australia in the final of the cycling team pursuit at the velodrome in Melbourne. Comfortably quicker in qualifying, Paul Manning, Rob Hayles, Chris Newton and Stephen Cummings - who are also world champions - lived up to their favourites tag. The win means a second gold in two days for Manning, who won the individual pursuit by beating Hayles in the final. The quartet earned rainbow jerseys at last year's worlds in Los Angeles representing Great Britain. But that was just a few months after they had lost to the Australians at the Athens Olympics, and victory for England was particularly sweet following their defeat by Australia in Manchester four years ago. All three British riders made it through qualifying and round one of the sprints. Story continues ADVERTISEMENT World champion Victoria Pendleton set a new Commonwealth record in the flying 200m qualifying round for the women's event. The 25-year-old former Newcastle University student knocked 0.177secs off the previous best 11.452 set by Canada's Lori-Ann Muenzer at the last Games. Ross Edgar, a bronze-medallist in the keirin yesterday, was quickest qualifier in the men's sprint. Fellow Scot Marco Librizzi rode a clever race to beat Mohamad Rizal Tisin, also of Malaysia, to a place in the last eight. England's Matt Crampton, with Edgar considered one of British cycling's great hopes for the future, was the second quickest qualifier.

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