Great Britain blasted out another incredible performance to win the gold medal in the team pursuit at the Beijing Olympics. The 3'53"314 not only secured the gold for Great Britain. It also was another world record, besting its previous own best of 3'55"202. The latter was set by the same team yesterday in the first round.
The British team was already ahead by over two seconds at the 2,500- metre mark, which is an eternity in the 4000-metre race. Great Britain had the Kiwis in sight pretty shortly after that. While Denmark narrowly avoided being caught, there was no question about who was the best team in the pursuit race.
Exciting Oceanic race for bronze
New Zealand outlasted Australia in the race for the bronze medal. The black-dressed New Zealanders led at every check, but initially only with small margins of 0.2 seconds or less.
It wasn't until with less than five laps to go when things became clearer. Graeme Brown had to pull out of the Aussie line-up. Only three riders have to finish the race. But with only three riders the gap grew to 0.4 seconds at the 3000-metre mark. By the time the Kiwis were down to three men the advantage had grown to almost one second. At the finish New Zealand had a 3'57"776, 1.3 seconds faster than the Aussies.
