Women’s Points Race, Men’s Kilometre Time Trial, Women’s Keirin and Men’s Madison; the final four titles of the 2018 UCI Track Cycling World Championships were decided.
Women
Keirin
Round 2
Defending champion Vogel (GER) and last year’s Bronze medallist Degrendele (BEL) both cruised through to the final for the medals, as did Dutch riders van Riessen and Braspennincx, as well as Krupeckaite (LTU) and Lee (HKG).
Heat 1
1 VOGEL Kristina GER (Q)
2 DEGRENDELE Nicky BEL (Q)
3 BRASPENNINCX Shanne NED (Q)
4 MARCHANT Katy GBR
5 CASAS Helena ESP
6 SHMELEVA Daria RUS
Heat 2
1 van RIESSEN Laurine NED (Q)
2 KRUPECKAITE Simona LTU (Q)
3 LEE Wai Sze HKG (Q)
4 LEE Hyejin KOR
5 BASOVA Liubov UKR
6 GAXIOLA Luz Daniela MEX
Finals
Nicky Degrendele of Belgium was both shocked and delighted as she crossed the line to become the new Keirin world champion. Last year’s winner Kristina Vogel (GER) didn’t look herself in the final and finished sixth. Hong Kong’s Wai Sze Lee bagged the Silver, with Simona Krupeckaite (LTU) picking up the Bronze.
GOLD DEGRENDELE Nicky BEL
SILVER LEE Wai Sze HKG
BRONZE KRUPECKAITE Simona LTU
4 van RIESSEN Laurine NED
5 BRASPENNINCX Shanne NED
6 VOGEL Kristina GER
Points Race
Much like the Women’s Madison the day before, the Points race was won entirely based on the sprints, with no riders taking any laps.
The early sprints were taken by Jennifer Valente of the USA and Canada’s Jasmin Duehring. After 30 laps, Elinor Barker (GBR), Kirsten Wild (NED), Jennifer Valente (USA) and Lydia Gurley (IRL) went on the attack, but they were soon brought back.
After the fifth sprint, with Wild leading, defending champion Elinor Barker (GBR) tried an attack. The Brit managed to secure the sixth sprint, but at 37 laps to go she sat up and rejoined the bunch.
The next three sprints saw utter dominance by Kirsten Wild (NED). She won all three and ensured that, unless anyone took a lap within 10 laps, she would take home the victory.
Sure enough, nobody could get away and the Wild claimed the Gold in the Women’s Points Race, her third title of the week.
GOLD WILD Kirsten NED (49)
SILVER VALENTE Jennifer USA (43)
BRONZE DUEHRING Jasmin CAN (30)
4 BADYKOVA Gulnaz RUS (29)
5 BECKER Charlotte GER (25)
6 SCHMIDT Trine DEN (24)
Men
Kilometre Time Trial
Final
Australia’s Matthew Glaetzer and Theo Bos of the Netherlands both put in sub-minute times in the final, but it wasn’t enough to beat Jeffrey Hoogland. The Dutchman absolutely buried himself to post a time of 59.459 and claim his second Gold of the Championships. He’d buried himself so much, in fact, that he collapsed as soon as he came off the track and still didn’t look like he’d quite recovered by the time he was up on the podium.
GOLD HOOGLAND Jeffrey NED 59.459
SILVER GLAETZER Matthew AUS 59.745
BRONZE BOS Theo NED 59.955
4 LAFARGUE Quentin FRA 1:00.407
5 ENGLER Eric GER 1:00.462
6 D’ALMEIDA Michael FRA 1:00.518
7 PUERTA Fabian COL 1:00.800
8 LIGTLEE Sam NED 1:01.421
Madison
The first 40 laps were relatively uneventful, with the sprint points being distributed among several of the teams.
At 155 laps to go, the team Austria launched an attack. It took them 18 laps, and then picked up two sprints along the way, but eventually they gained the valuable lap to take them into the lead.
Not long after, Poland and Denmark made a move but they were soon brought back. After 130 laps, the pace really picked up and the field fragmented all over the track.
In amongst the madness, the team from Australia went on the attack. The pairing of Cameron Meyer and Callum Scotson, both individual medallists from earlier in the week, had to work hard for their lap gain but it came at 87 laps to go and they went into the lead.
With 83 showing on the board, Germany accelerated off the front of the bunch. They were soon followed by the pair from Spain. The Germans became the fourth team to gain a lap and, after scoring in multiple sprints, they took the lead of the race. A few laps later and Spain also took a lap.
Belgium, Australia and Denmark were then out front for several laps. At one point, it looked as though the trio would gain a lap and put Australia back into the lead but it never happened.
In the final 40 laps, there were a number of teams who tried to get away but the team from Germany weren’t letting them have any of it.
The final sprint was won by Denmark but it was Germany who took the Men’s Madison title, the first rainbow jerseys for Roger Kluge and Theo Reinhardt.
Spain ended up second, 8 points behind the Germans, and Australia just held on to Bronze ahead of Great Britain.
GOLD Germany (KLUGE Roger, REINHARDT Theo) (53)
SILVER Spain (TORRES Albert, MORA Sebastian) (45)
BRONZE Australia (MEYER Cameron, SCOTSON Callum) (37)
4 Great Britain (WOOD Oliver, STEWART Mark) (36)
5 Austria (GRAF Andreas, MULLER Andreas) (32)
6 Denmark (LARSEN Niklas, von FOLSACH Casper) (29)