Olympic Games: Dutch top medal table so far

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The Netherlands has kept its place at the top of the cycling medal table at the Olympic Games despite a poor opening night on the track, while Great Britain jumped up to second with their first gold medal in the cycling events.

All three of the Netherlands’ medals so far have come from the road events, with Anna van der Breggen sealing gold in the women’s road race and bronze in the time trial. Tom Dumoulin brought their total to three with second in the men’s time trial, despite breaking his wrist just a few weeks earlier. The Dutch suffered a bad night in the velodrome with the team sprint squad knocked out by Australia in round one while the hopes of the team pursuiters were ended with a crash in qualifying. 

Great Britain is now snapping at their heels after taking gold on the boards in the men’s team sprint. The British line-up of Jason Kenny, Callum Skinner and Philip Hindes missed out on a medal at the World Championships in London earlier this year but rallied and beat the pre-event favourites New Zealand by just a tenth of a second. That is added to Chris Froome’s bronze in the men’s time trial, giving them two medals from five events so far.

Belgium, Switzerland, and the United States are also hovering around the top of the table in third, fourth and fifth after their success on the road. The United States will expect to add to their tally in the coming days when they go for gold in the women's team pursuit and women's Omnium

New Zealand’s performance in the team sprint moves them into a group of countries with one silver medal, just behind Denmark and ahead of Russia and Sweden. They went well in the men’s team pursuit qualifying rounds and will go off against Australia, who are not yet on the medal table, for a chance at gold. Great Britain will go up against the Danish team in the other semi-final.