The first track cycling event of the Olympic year kicked off with a promising two silver medals for Great Britain in the women’s team sprint and men’s elimination race, plus men’s team sprint shock and two team pursuit gold medal ride-off qualifications at the 2024 UEC Track Elite European Championships.

Team sprint

In the women’s team sprint, Sophie Capewell, Emma Finucane, Katy Marchant and Lowri Thomas ended the day with a silver medal after a valiant effort to topple world champions, Germany. Capewell, Finucane and Thomas started the day qualifying 0.061 seconds behind Germany, before Marchant stepped in for Thomas in the first round to comfortably beat the Ukranian trio.

In the gold medal ride off, Marchant delivered an incredibly fast first lap of 18.750 seconds. Followed by strong laps from both Finucane and Capwell, the trio couldn’t quite match the Germans’ power and took the silver medal with a difference of just 0.252 seconds.

After the event, P2 rider Capewell said: “It’s interesting as we've literally just come out of a super heavy block, so coming out with a time which I think is our fastest apart from the world championships, and even matched one of our worlds times is pretty special. It’s actually a little bit of motivation going forward and knowing how much more to is to come."

On their rivalry with the Germans and future goals, Marchant added: “We’ve just got to keep working and concentrate on ourselves. We keep pushing the Germans to almost breaking world records every time we come up against them, if not breaking world records, so it's really exciting. We have a long-term, goal, obviously that's Paris, and we're confident in our ability and  I think as a team we’re in a really good place.”

In the men’s event, Jack Carlin, Ali Fielding and Hamish Turnbull had a confident qualifying ride, going third fastest with a time of 43.240, which they backed up by going faster in round one against the Czech Republic to race for the bronze medal.

In an explosive bronze final against Poland, Great Britain started incredibly strong and continued to lead, creating a 0.326 second gap until, with just half a lap to go, Poland managed to bridge the gap and just pipped the Brits to the medal, leaving them in fourth place by just 0.028 seconds.

Men’s elimination

Will Tidball raced a calm and controlled elimination, consistently well-positioning himself and conserving energy for the sprint laps to make his way to the final few laps with apparent ease. The race was neutralised after a minor crash for the Belgian rider with just six riders left on the track and, following the restart, Tidball found himself narrowly escaping elimination after being boxed in on the black line.

A tactical reposition to the front saw Tidball hold on until a final showdown against Dane Tobias Hansen. At the final bell, Tidball launched an attack and took his opportunity, but with half a lap left of the race, Hansen turned on the gas and managed to catch the British rider, ultimately overtaking him for the win, leaving Tidball to take a well-fought silver medal.

Team Pursuit

It was a seamless start to the championships for the British team pursuit teams, with both the men’s and women’s squads making their way into tomorrow’s gold medal ride offs with ease.

The men’s quartet of Dan Bigham, Ethan Hayter, Ethan Vernon and Ollie Wood looked in good form, qualifying second just behind leaders Denmark and continued that form in round one, beating Italy to go against Denmark in the gold medal race with a time of 3:48.524.

In the women’s event, after qualifying third in the morning session, Jess Roberts subbed in for Neah Evans to join reigning world champions Meg Barker, Josie Knight and Anna Morris for round one. A smooth ride saw them take five seconds off their qualifying time with 4:12.866, to meet Italy in tomorrow’s gold medal ride.

Tomorrow will see Sophie Capewell and Emma Finucane back in action for the individual sprint qualifying rounds, while Joe Truman competes in the men’s 1km time- trial. Sophie Lewis takes on the women’s scratch race while Ethan Hayter teams up with Mark Stewart in the men’s Madison and the men’s and women’s team pursuit squads return to the track to fight for gold.

You can watch the evening’s finals from 5.30pm UK time on Discovery+ and follow live updates via British Cycling’s social media channels.