Hat-trick hero! Finucane makes history with bronze

When Chris Hoy and Laura Kenny picked out a British cyclist to watch ahead of the Olympics in Paris, it was worth sitting up and taking notice.

- JAMIE BRAIDWOOD

After seven brutal days at the Saint-Quentin-enYvelines National Velodrome and with the pressure of being Team GB’s next great hope, Emma Finucane did not just meet those expectations but surpass them. At her first Olympics, the 21-year-old from Wales became the first British woman in 60 years to win three medals at a single Games.

A final bronze in the women’s sprint was added to gold alongside Katy Marchant and Sophie Capewell in the team sprint earlier this week, as well as another bronze in the keirin. It is a haul that even the greats of British cycling – Laura Kenny, Victoria Pendleton, Elinor Barker and fellow Welsh rider Becky James among them – did not manage, or indeed out of everyone else in Team GB’s contingent in Paris. Finucane’s bronze in the individual sprint made her the most successful British athlete of these Olympics.