Lack Of Competition A ‘Blessing' For Pursuit Team

GB coach tells Vern Pitt ‘dress rehearsals’ yielded promising results

- Vern Pitt

The GB men’s team pursuit team are unconcerned about the relative lack of competition in this crucial track season ahead of the Olympics and actually view it as a “blessing”, according to coach Iain Dyer.

The team pursuit squad were one of two core components of the BC set-up that did not make the journey to Bulgaria for the European Championships, the biggest international competition this winter, alongside the men’s sprint team. That came off the back of the World Championships, the last track contest in February, where the team finished seventh. There they were more than five seconds off the new world record pace set by the Danish quartet, who also skipped the Euros.

Instead GB opted to do a “dress rehearsal” competition at the National Cycling Centre velodrome in Manchester. Men’s endurance coach Dyer said: “Obviously, it’s qualifying mode all the time, because we didn’t have another team on the track. We did two back-to-back runs on one day and a third one the following day.”

Dyer was tight lipped on the conclusions from those efforts but did say: “I would say it went extremely well. Very pleased with the outcomes.”