Pursuit golds for Archibald and Tanfield

Pursuit golds for Archibald and Tanfield

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Katie Archibald and Charlie Tanfield claimed Commonwealth individual pursuit gold on the second day of track cycling at the Anna Meares Velodrome.

There was also a second cycling medal of the Games for Wales as Lewis Oliva won silver in the keirin.

Perfect pursuiting

Katie Archibald won her first ever Commonwealth title with two sensational rides in the individual pursuit.

The Team Scotland rider set a Games record in qualifying - stopping the clock in 3:24.119 - almost five seconds faster than the previous record set by Joanna Rowsell Shand in Glasgow four years ago.

That put Archibald up against home rider Rebecca Wiasak in the final - and despite a strong start for the Australian, Archibald showed her class to claim the gold in a time of 3:26.088, winning by almost 1.5 seconds.

Speaking to BBC Sport, Archibald said: "This means so much. You sometimes feel embarrassed about over-egging the pride of wearing the Scotland jersey, but this meant so much.

"It's a fantastic day. As soon as I walked in, I knew I was good for it.

"The Archibalds aren't known for parties but this is going to be the biggest Friday night we've had in a while.”

There was double cause for celebration for the Archibald family after Katie’s brother John claimed silver in the individual pursuit in a battle of the Brits.

The Scottish rider pushed team pursuit world champion Charlie Tanfield all the way in both qualification and the final - setting a time of 4:13.068 in qualification to break the Commonwealth Games record.

Charlie Tanfield wins the Commonwealth Games individual pursuit gold

But Tanfield - winner of a world cup medal in the individual pursuit this season - went faster still, setting a time of 4:11.455 to take the record in one of the fastest times ever produced.

The final was more tactical, with Tanfield taking an early lead before Archibald dug deep to push back, but ran out of laps to reduce the arrears with the English rider stopping the clock in 4:15.952, just over half a second faster than his Scottish Team KGF teammate.

Wales won a second medal of the Games on the boards as Lewis Oliva won silver in the keirin.

The Welshman made a late charge to take second place in the final behind Australia’s Matthew Glaetzer with Scotland’s Jack Carlin just missing out on the podium in fourth place behind New Zealand’s Ed Dawkins.