Great Britain set new world mark to claim first gold of the championships

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Great Britain set a new world record (3:53.295) in the gold medal ride off, pipping Australia by two tenths of a second to end the home team's run two-year run in the rainbow jersey, meantime New Zealand fought back in their clash with Russia to win the bronze medal.

The time of Great Britain bettered their time (3:53.314) set at the Beijing Olympic Games four year ago.

Andrew Tennant sat out in the final for Great Britain, replaced by Steven Burke, while there was no change to the Australian line up of Jack Bobridge, Glenn O'Shea, Rohan Dennis and Michael Hepburn. Great Britain took the race out from the gun with around three tenths of a second separating the two teams over the opening laps.

With 1500m down, Australia had closed the gap and the teams were on equal terms. Australia then edged ahead over the next 1000m before the Brits had their noses slightly back in front.

Seven tenths of a second separated the teams on the bell lap with Great Britain surging for the line with Geraint Thomas at the front of the train helping the reigning Olympic champions to an average speed of 61.7km/h.

Thomas, said that he was pleased with the turn around in results from the London World Cup in February.

"It was a great race, it reminds me of Manchester back in '08, before the Games. We broke the world record there as well. I think we made a lot of gains after that and I'm sure we can do the same now."

Ed Clancy, the only remaining member of the quartet which won gold in Beijing, explained that it was an arm-wrestle to earn their new title.

"I don't think we've ever had to fight as hard as that for a win," said Clancy. "It was pretty epic.

"Those last couple of laps, me and Pete [Kennaugh] were absolute passengers. We were just hanging in there. I just finished the last whole lap off the back.

"I was almost expecting the worst when I looked at the scoreboard. I thought, 'we're going to lose it on me'."

Bobridge meanwhile could not hide his disappointment.

"It feels like a great big kick in the guts," he said.

"We went over there, we got one-up on their home turf, they've come here, they've kicked us back in the guts and beat us.

"We just have to rebound from here, use it as positive energy."

New Zealand rallied hard to overcome Russia, who led for the first half of the race. The Kiwi's time (3:57.592) was two seconds faster than their qualifying mark.

Qualifying report:

World record holders Team GB set the fastest time in qualifying (3:54.485), setting up a thrilling first night of action at Hisense Arena in Melbourne, Australia.

Australia may have had the Brit's mettle at the London World Cup, but on home soil, Jack Bobridge, Glenn O'Shea, Rohan Dennis and Michael Hepburn faded in the dying laps to qualify second fastest for the evening final. In the bronze medal ride off, New Zealand will race Russia.

Ed Clancy the man to set the wheels in motion for Team GB. From there, the Kiwi's earlier benchmarks were whittled away. By the 2500 metre mark, Team GB was up by nearly one second. Andrew Tennant, the man brought into the squad after solid training performances throughout the month of March, left it to his teammates Geraint Thomas, Peter Kennaugh and Clancy to cross the line, dropping out with a lap to go. 3:54.485 was the time to beat – the third fastest time in history, and the fastest time recorded in Australia. In a promising sign for the disciplined outfit, the time was just over a second outside their world record set at the Beijing Olympic Games four years ago.

Australia, last team on the track was three tenths of a second down on the Brits at the 500m mark but by 875m the World Cup leaders were back in front. The Australian team gradually increased their lead and at the halfway mark, were on world record pace, something that again had the crowd on the edge of their seats with one kilometre remaining clocking 2:56. A big effort from O'Shea forced him to drop behind his teammates and the remaining trio faded over the final two laps, visibly disappointed with their time of 3:54.654

Kazakhstan was the first team to get racing underway. Signs for the newly-sanded Hisense Arena track were good with the team bettering their previous best time for the season, set in Astana late last year, by eight seconds clocking 4:13.145.

It was somewhat of a dramatic outing for the Swiss team, who lost their first rider around the halfway mark with lead man the first to dip out. With a kilometre remaining, the trio was nearly reduced to two, and were forced to slow their pace slightly, eventually setting a 4:09.200.

Asian Games champions, Korea suggested they were not to be discounted among the early starters, setting a new best time out of the first six, of 4:06.970 but from that point on, the benchmark began to tumble.

Beijing Olympic silver medallists, Denmark (4:03.237), and then Belgium (4:02.317) kept the hotseat busy before the German's recorded a time of 4:05.078.

Spain took the option of a gradual wind up for their quickest time of the year 4:01.717, with their final two laps going a long way to putting them at the top of the table.

New Zealand was the first team to crack the four minute mark with Marc Ryan leading the team out of the blocks to ensure they were half a second up on the previous best set by Belgium after 500 metres. Ryan left it to Sam Bewley, Aaron Gate and Wes Gough to bring it home 3:59.156.

The Russian's preparation had been disrupted by Ivan Kovalev's injury after he was hit by a car while training in Sydney in the lead up to the championships, with Artur Ershov brought into the quartet. It was clear that they would be no match for Team GB, 2.7secs down at the 3000m mark just scraping inside the four minute barrier with 3:59.290.

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