German track sprint team for Olympics named

The German cycling federation BDR has announced its selection for the track team sprint event at the London 2012 Olympics this summer. It will be the same line-up as four years ago in Beijing, when Germany won the bronze medal with René Enders, Maximilian Levy and Stefan Nimke. Robert Förstemann has been appointed as reserve.

"The team sprint is our first priority," said federal trainer Detlev Uibel, who is determined to make his team score another medal - preferably gold - at this year's Olympics.

The decision of who was going to be reserve was not easy. "On our team, the fourth man is better than 80 percent of all the participants," said Levy, but Uibel explained his choice was made for tactical reasons.

The first and third position in the three-lap sprint were evident, with Enders being "the best in the world" as a lead-out man and Nimke, four-time kilometer world champion, the one who has the most power going into the final lap. "My question was, how am I going to optimize the second position. If you want to win in London, you have to ride a world record," said Uibel. He opted for Levy because he scored the best time in that position at the Astana World Cup last year.

On the women's side, the team sprint selection did not generate any discussion: Miriam Welte and Kristina Vogel will try to repeat the world record feat from the Cali World Cup at the Olympic Games in London.