Day 1

 

National Senior and Disability Track Championships

2-6 October 2007, Manchester Velodrome

 

Day 1

 

Endurance rider Ed Clancy rode a very special 1.04 to get the Silver just behind Jamie Staff and ahead of Jason Kenny.

 

Victoria Pendleton and Jamie Staff were the first gold medal winners of the Championships as the 2007 Senior & Disability Track Champs got underway at the Manchester Velodrome. The now familiar opening evening fare of the 500m TT and Kilo saw good fields, with over 40 competitors lining up to test themselves over the newly refurbished boards.

 

Although the winning times were not stunning - Staff was over a second and a half slower than his bronze winning ride at the worlds - the competition was fierce as ever, especially for the silver and bronze medals. Ed Clancy will have surprised a few with his silver in the Kilo: best known as an endurance rider, his time was a reminder of the tall world team pursuit gold medallist's all-round ability. He will have taken particular pleasure from beating fellow "endurance" rider Rob Hayles' silver-medal winning time in the 2006 championships by over a second.

 

For Kenny, it was a second successive bronze medal in the event at the championships, but he too will have been pleased with the time, which knocked a round second off his performance of a year ago.

 

Meanwhile Paralympic athlete Jody Cundy achieved a personal ambition by making the top ten in the event. Like disabled South African runner Oscar Pistorious, such is his dominance that he now bench-marks himself against able-bodied athletes. The week before the championships he spelled out his ambitions:

"The profile of disability sport is improving. In terms of cycling, the likes of myself and a couple of others are helping as our times are coming down and are considered impressive on an able-bodied basis. If I could finish in the top ten of the able-bodied Kilo next week, it would help open people's eyes to our achievements."

Well, he certainly achieved that, recording one minute ten exactly and slotting in to tenth place.

 

Anna Blyth took four tenths of her PB to win the Silver whilst Victoria Pendleton won yet another title with World Junior Championship medallist Jess Varnish showing yet again she has what it takes to be a champion on the track in the future.

 

Victoria Pendleton habitually picks up a hatful of medals at these championships (not to mention the Worlds, this year!) and again, perhaps the greater interest was in the lesser placings, where Anna Blyth repeated her silver of 2007 and, like Kenny, in a considerably improved time - in this case 1.5 seconds, a massive margin in a two-lap event. Last year's bronze medal winner, Janet Birkmyre had to settle for fourth this time as young sprinter Jess Varnish marked her senior championships debut with a solid ride.

 

RIDER REACTIONS

Ed Clancy: Admitting his ride was a personal best, Ed Clancy went on to say that in the Team Pursuit, with four riders not one, the team would go through in a ‘3’ or ‘4’ for the opening standing start kilo. “I’m pretty quick for an endurance guy off the line and was going man 1 in Majorca and have been working on my speed. The track looks nice but I haven’t been on it that much to be honest. It wasn’t particularly fast tonight but in general I think it’s a little quicker and smoother. Come Manchester, I think we’ll have a good stab at that World Record (Team Pursuit).”

 

Victoria Pendleton “The ride was all right. A bit quicker than I expected but it didn’t feel very nice – I’m just not ready for it!. The track is good. We have been training on it for a while now and the new surface feels a lot more solid and over time it will get faster and faster and by the Worlds it should be awesome.”

 

Jamie Staff: “It’s going to be an interesting year ahead” Jamie said talking about the strength in depth the GB Sprint squad have. “We have just come back from a road block in Majorca for a week and this is only my second time on the track since then. The road and gym work is going well and for where I am in the season, I am very happy”.

 

“I have had a busy summer with a lot of travelling to Beijing with Shanaze  and so the other commitments have kept me busy this summer but the BMX is over for the time being so I am now really focused on getting my head down and doing some decent work on the track.”

 

“I am going to be based here over the winter as the squad is splitting with some going to Australia and some starting here so I’m looking forward to being here and getting some decent track time”.

 

Anna Blyth “That was four tenths faster than my PB so I am really happy with that for this time year. I’ve just finished a block on the road with some aerobic work and its just a steady build up for the World Cups.”

 

Jason Kenny “I wasn’t sure what to expect out there tonight. I have just done a road block in Majorca and had a bit of a cold so I went out there and just smashed it and see what happens. It was slightly better than last year.”

PHOTOS (more coming tomorrow morning)

 

Victoria Pendleton

 

Anna Blyth

 

Jess Varnish

 

Sarah Bailey

 

Jason Kenny and Jamie Staff

 

Ed Clancy was impressive in his Kilo as was World Disablity Champion Jody Cundy

 

Results

Men's Kilo

1 Jamie STAFF scienceinsport.com 01m 03.7s - 56.533 kph 35.333 mph
2 Ed CLANCY Landbrouwkredit 01:04.1 - 56.127 kph 35.08 mph
3 Jason KENNY scienceinsport.com 01:04.4 - 55.872 kph 34.92 mph
4 Bruce CROALL City of Edinburgh RC 01:05.2 - 55.243 kph 34.527 mph
5 David DANIELL Cleveland Wheelers 01:06.2 - 54.355 kph 33.972 mph
6 Josh HARGREAVES Sportscity Velo 01:07.0 - 53.723 kph 33.577 mph
7 Ben ELLIOTT VC St Raphael 01:07.3 - 53.504 kph 33.44 mph
8 Christian LYTE Sportscity Velo 01:08.3 - 52.692 kph 32.932 mph
9 Gwyn CARLESS Yasumitsu Schlaap 01:09.7 - 51.625 kph 32.265 mph
10 Jody CUNDY VC St Raphael 01:10.0 - 51.449 kph 32.156 mph
11 Adam THOMPSON VC St Raphael 01:10.5 - 51.049 kph 31.905 mph
12 Steven ROE Team Swift-Allsports 01:10.7 - 50.947 kph 31.842 mph
13 Simon CHURTON Yasumitsu Schlaap 01:11.0 - 50.694 kph 31.683 mph
14 Ian GREENSTREET Newbury RC 01:11.7 - 50.199 kph 31.374 mph
15 Steve DAVIES Ferryhill Wheelers 01:12.9 - 49.365 kph 30.853 mph
16 Tom COLLIER Lifeforce Creation Heather Bird 01:13.1 - 49.246 kph 30.779 mph
17 Robert COX Cambridge CC 01:14.1 - 48.586 kph 30.366 mph
18 Stefan CWIKLINSKI Yasumitsu Schlaap 01:14.7 - 48.201 kph 30.126 mph
19 Andrew HEWITT Brooks Cycles 01:15.4 - 47.749 kph 29.843 mph
20 Kyleigh MANNERS Newport Phoenix 01:18.8 - 45.711 kph 28.569 mph
21 John HUNTER-HASCHKA Redhill CC 01:23.2 - 42.763 kph 26.727 mph
 Nick STRUGNELL Oxonian CC DNF     
 Andy STUART VC St Raphael DNS     
      
Women's 500m Time Trial       
1 Victoria PENDLETON scienceinsport.com 34.825s - 51.687 kph 32.304 mph
2 Anna BLYTH VC St Raphael 35.259 - 51.051 kph 31.907 mph
3 Jess VARNISH Halesowen A & CC 36.806 - 48.905 kph 30.566 mph
4 Janet BIRKMYRE Sportscover-Planet X 37.393 - 48.137 kph 30.086 mph
5 Helen SCOTT Halesowen A & CC 37.984 - 47.388 kph 29.618 mph
6 Jennifer DAVIS City of Edinburgh RC 39.096 - 46.041 kph 28.775 mph
7 Sarah BAILEY VC St Raphael 39.458 - 45.618 kph 28.511 mph
8 Daisy SHERWOOD City of Edinburgh RC 40.127 - 44.858 kph 28.036 mph
9 Becki RIMMINGTON VC St Raphael 40.723 - 44.201 kph 27.626 mph
10 Femke VAN SCHELVEN Fat Birds CC 42.284 - 42.569 kph 26.606 mph
11 Lynn HAMEL thegreenroomgroup.com 44.319 - 40.615 kph 25.384 mph