British Sprinters Prepare for Major Championship

 

July 11; Newport Velodrome

Home Page European Track Champs

 

At the Newport Velodrome (Wales) this week, the Junior (and Under 23 Sprinter Matt Crampton) have been putting the final touches to their preparation for the European championships. There to help them was the National Sprint coach Iain Dyer and a German rider familiar to cycling fans in Britain, Jan van Eijden (Interview).

 

Jan van Eijden and our own Jason Kenny in a classic Germany versus Britain battle during training at Newport.

Jan won his World Sprint title at Manchester in 2000 and is also a regular at World Track Cups and Revolution meetings at Manchester. He is regarded as one of the worlds leading Sprint riders, especially when it comes to tactics and he was at Newport to pass on that experience to the British riders by going out on the track with them and testing them with various strategies and then going through them off the track using the video feedback provided by the EIS.

The week at Newport is the culmination of many training camps for the Olympic Development Programme riders, both here in the UK and in Europe, where the sprinters have been able to get a lot of experience riding different tracks and race experience against Junior and Senior riders. One of the squad, Jason Kenny, has set a number of new track records in the process as he's impressed people up and down the UK and in Europe. The same applies to Under 23 sprinter Matthew Crampton who has also been busy and recently won three out of three events in Austria at a European Challenge.

Whilst in Newport, the emphasis for the riders has been on the finishing touches required for a major competition and we spoke to team coach Iain Dyer who has now spent 18 months working with this group of riders now travelling to Athens. Iain is really pleased with the way the preparation has gone for what is a major performance target for the team. "The preparation is going particularly well now that the young riders are free of exam and study commitments" he explained to us after the session had finished.

"Having the riders on a full time basis is a real luxury for me and if anything, I have to be careful to keep their enthusiasm in check and make sure at this late stage we don't over do it. One of my priorities this week is to look at areas where we can exploit the biggest gains. At this stage, it's unlikely we're going to see a gain of a tenth or two in speed and the most important gains we can make at this stage are technical and strategic gains. So to have someone like Jan on board for the week, a guy who is probably the most tactically astute racer around and has been of his generation, has been a real asset to the team. The riders respond really well to his input and have had a really good time with him here."

It isn't the first time the team have had a guest come in either to ride and chat to the riders as Britain's 'new' Sprint star, 2006 World Sprint Silver medallist Craig MacLean also did this before he went to Japan.

"We had a coach led racing weekend in Manchester last month and I looked around at who we could get some great input from, and who could also stretch the riders. We also wanted someone the riders look up to and could learn from. I knew Craig was in the UK, which is a rare moment in itself, and he was only too pleased to help out for the weekend which was great for us."

"Everybody responded really well to him and I thought that of all the camps we had done since the Winter, that this was the one the riders benefited from the most and you could hear the pennies dropping when we were talking about the tactical elements of the racing."

 

Anna Blyth, 2005 World Junior Silver Sprint medallist (and bronze in the Keirin) battles with Lucy Ayres in training as they go through various tactical exchanges which saw them each getting to the line first in various mock races.

 

Christian Lyte and Josh Hargreaves during the training session at Newport.

The European Sprint Team
The team of six going to Athens this year has been together for 18 months now although a few of them were unable to travel to Italy's Europeans last year due to their age. Having been training and racing together for so long means that even the first year Juniors are very experienced and at home in the team set up as they prepare for a major championship.

"Hopefully they can now all go to Athens and not be over awed by it" Ian explained. "We have already raced internationally several times this year which for Junior sprinters is relatively rare thing. This means its good we can go to Athens and concentrate on our jobs and not be over awed by the circumstances or the international setting."

Having a team of six juniors, four men and two women, also means that they can race all the events including the Team Sprint, a core event for the Great Britain team. "All the riders know what their events are going to be now and this has added an extra focus to this week where the riders can do a particular drill and relate it to their event."

"For Junior sprinting in Great Britain, to come away with such a big team is fantastic. Sprinting has not been the biggest discipline in the past but now with this team, we have every event covered with the maximum amount of riders allowed (2 per event) which is great."

As for the importance of the Europeans coming as it does a few weeks before the World Junior Championships, Ian says "In some respects, the Europeans is regarded as a stepping stone but ultimately, any competition where they can race with international company is a golden opportunity and in the grand scheme of things, this is about how it fits into their make up as a developing rider and how they can benefit in the years to come from it. We're not so short sighted that we are just looking at the next four weeks as there is a much bigger picture here."

 

The Juniors changing their gears, something they get used to in the training camps to help them become more independent.

Within the Sprint team, three of them are second year juniors -- Jason Kenny, Anna Blyth and Lucy Ayres whilst Josh Hargreaves, David Daniell and Christian Lyte still have another year left which means the team have yet more time to help them reach their potential within this category. It's a great benefit of the GB programmes being put in place that these young riders are already good enough to beat internationally ranked seniors and there is more to come says the National coach.

"It challenges me when I think where our Junior 1's are now with the junior 1's we had last year. We're already ahead of the game and now that we have the National Youth programme (Talent Team) squad up and running this year, when next years junior 1s come in, they are going to be a step ahead of the game again. So by the time we get around to Junior 2 in a couple of years, in terms of their technical skills it should be at an all time high. I am not necessarily after faster riders at that point, but technically and tactically astute riders."

After years of being accused of 'breeding' time trialists, the team has certainly come on in leaps and bounds in the other events like the Sprint and Keirin as well as the Team Sprint (Olympic disciplines). Describing how well his riders are now tactically, Iain says "'they're far in advance of Junior sprinters from previous generations".

 

RELATED LINKS

Jason Kenny Interview >>>>>

Anna Blyth Interview >>>>

Matthew Crampton Interview >>>>

Jan van Eijden (Interview)

 

More Photographs

 

David Daniell in a race effort against Lucy Ayres.

Rest -- an important part of the training process.

 

Jason Kenny shows Anna Blyth the respect she deserves as they go up against each other in a race effort at Newport.