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Rio 2016: Women's team pursuit seal third cycling gold for Britain as Laura Trott makes history

Britain's dominance in the veldrome continues as the women's team pursuit adds to Team GB's medal tally

Kevin Garside
Rio de Janeiro
Saturday 13 August 2016 21:32 BST
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The women's team pursuit
The women's team pursuit

Britain’s power women banked yet more bullion in the Velodrome with the team pursuit quartet smashing their own world record to take gold and Becky James claiming silver in the Keirin.

Laura Trott, Katie Archibald, Elinor Barker and Joanna Rowsell-Shand played a game of cat and mouse with the United States squad who had dared to impose their own world record status at this meet.

The lead went to and fro until the final four laps at which point the British squad left scorch marks on the track to blow the American challenge away. The world champions were a distant second and trailed by almost two seconds.

The British quartet made it three rides, three world records in claiming their stunning victory in four minutes 10.236 seconds.

It was Trott's third Olympic gold - the most by a British female - and Rowsell-Shand's second. The pair won gold in the event at London 2012 on 'Super Saturday', alongside Dani King.

A day after Britain's men won in the four-rider, four-kilometres event, theirs was a victory in the corresponding women's event.

Becky James was a coat of paint from adding a gold of her own in the Keirin, storming through the pack on the final lap only to lose out in a blanket finish to Holland’s Elis Ligtlee by 0.033 of a second, with Australia’s Anna Mears in third.

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