Lewis Oliva wants to be in medal contention when he wears the colours of the Great Britain Cycling Team for the first time in this season's UCI Track Cycling World Cup.

The 21-year-old Welshman is part of a youthful squad for the final round of the series in Guadalajara, Mexico.

Oliva has competed at the opening two rounds - in Manchester and Aguascalientes respectively - for Welsh squad Team USN, forming part of his build-up to this year’s Commonwealth Games in Glasgow.

“It's nice to back in the GB colours, I've been very grateful and lucky with the support of Team USN, those guys have got a fantastic setup down there (in Newport),” said British Cycling Olympic Podium Programme athlete Oliva.

“It's always nice to be involved again in the GB setup, obviously we all train together full-time up here (in Manchester) and we've got a lot of input from the coaches and support staff which is fantastic to see.

“It is fantastic once again to be involved in the setup and travel as part of the team and hopefully try and break into the team sprint mould.”

Oliva has taken part in the keirin and individual sprint in the UCI series, progressing to the second round of the keirin in Aguascalientes.

He has also appeared at the Revolution track series and hopes he can deliver his finest performance of the season to date in South America in the last major meeting before February's UCI Track Cycling World Championships.

"I've been happy with performances so far," Oliva said. "I think all things taken into account with how we have had to adapt to certain training I'm happy with how things are, the coaches are happy.

"So leading up now to Mexico world cup, in Guadalajara, we are expecting some big performances as part of the team sprint and then individually in both the sprint and keirin events.

"We've had quite an interesting season so far trying to balance a few different emphases, so we've tried working without the gym for a little bit, trying to work more on the bike and out on the road and doing some different training stimulus."

Oliva will also have a ride in the team sprint. Scottish riders Callum Skinner and John Paul, the latter returning to the Great Britain team as a guest rider for the event, will complete the line-up for Friday’s event.

Olympic champions Jason Kenny and Philip Hindes plus Kian Emadi and Matt Crampton have been the preferred selections in the world cup far, winning bronze and silver.

Oliva, though, is adamant that the less experienced trio can deliver in Mexico.

"On balance we've got quite a strong team there," Oliva said.

"JP (John Paul) will fill the man one slot out there, at the minute it looks like Callum is going to go man two off the back of some good form recently riding Revolutions and I'm going to try and bring it home as best I can in man three.

"We've got quite a good chance as a team. Then individually, been going well so there's no reason we couldn't get on the podium."

British Cycling will be reporting on the final round of the UCI Track Cycling World Cup, which begins on Friday.