Track World Championships: Ganna smashes pursuit world record

Men's Individual Pursuit

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Filippo Ganna smashes the men's individual pursuit world record at the 2022 UCI World Championships at the Saint Quentin en Yvelines velodrome on Friday, bettering the mark made at last year's Worlds by Ashton Lambie (USA) by almost 0.3 seconds.

Ganna powered over the 4,000 metre race, finishing with a time of 3:59.636 to win the gold medal over compatriot Jonathan Milan by 4.1 seconds, with Ivo Oliveira (Portugal) taking the bronze ahead of Dan Bigham (Great Britain).

The feat was the first ever sub-four minute 4km pursuit at sea level.

The mark comes just six days after Ganna crushed the UCI Hour Record, covering 56.792 kilometres to beat not only the more recent unified record, but the best human effort set by Chris Boardman in 1996.

Now, he's taken the mantle from the American multi-discipline specialist after suffering a stinging disappointment in the team pursuit, where Great Britain got the better of his Italian team.

"I think it's an amazing week. I tried to do something special and I think realized one of my dreams, tried to do the hour record and the individual pursuit record and I do it. Now we think just to celebrate and recover a little bit because it's been a really intense season.

"I want to say thank you to everyone who supported me with big emotion."

Ganna said the Hour Record training helped him to power out the final kilometre of the 4km individual pursuit.

"I learned a lot for the position, for the effort. I think one secret is the preparation for the amazing Hour Record. Today we took another big goal."

Women's Omnium

Valente wins Omnium world title 

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Jennifer Valente won the Women's Omnium on Friday, easily marking her nearest rival Maike van der Duin (Netherlands) in the final event, the Points Race, to claim the gold. Van der Duin made it another medal for the Dutch with silver, while Maria Martins (Portugal) won the bronze.

Valente opened the Women's Omnium with a big flyer with five laps to go, blasting out of the bunch to take the early lead in the four-race event. But the American lost the lead when five riders got away to steal a lap in the Tempo Race, with Maike van der Duin winning the event to take the lead by two points ahead of Valente, while Norway's Anita Stenberg sat in third.

However, when it came to the Elimination Race, Van der Duin fell too far back in the bunch and missed the cut with seven laps remaining and dropped out of the lead as Valente smoothly hovered at the front.

Valente attacked when there were three laps to go with Balsamo and Kopecky left in the field. Valente kept the lead as Balsamo nudged Kopecky into third then attacked Balsamo to win the Elimination Race and move back into the top of the standings over Van der Duin by eight points.

In the points race, an early move by Karolina Karasiewicz (Poland) and Verena Eberhardt (Austria) was no threat, and Valente added one point to her total by taking fourth from the bunch. After the move came back, she surged to the front to take the second sprint and, since Great Britain's Sophie Lewis got ahead of Van der Duin, Valente's lead ballooned out to 12 points.

The race for bronze heated up as Lotte Kopecky (Belgium) attacked, gained a lap, claimed the third sprint, and moved into sixth. Maria Martin (Portugal) moved over Stenberg by taking three points in the sprint from the field.

Kopecky attacked again, going in pursuit of a four-rider move with Yumi Kajihara (Japan), Amalie Dideriksen (Denmark), Aline Seitz (Switzerland) and Lea Lin Teutenberg (Germany). Sensing the threat, Valente came to the front to chase Kopecky and brought her back, but, no threat to the podium yet, the peloton eased and the four leaders took the lap.

Van der Duin won the next sprint, playing off an attack from Canada's Maggie Coles-Lyster, and whittled her gap to Valente down to nine points.

Kopecky surged yet again, this time pulling away Valente, Van der Duin, Dideriksen, Martins and Copponi but the impetus wasn't there and New Zealand's Michaela Drummond closed it down.

Four riders escaped to mop up the points in the final sprint, giving the Olympic champion Valente a rainbow jersey in the Omnium.

Men's Points Race

Emotional first career rainbows for Havik in points race

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The Netherlands added another world title in the first event of Friday evening's session, with Yoeri Havik riding an aggressive and astute Points Race to secure the rainbow jersey of his career. Roger Kluge (Germany) sprinted to the silver medal, with Belgium's Fabio Van Den Bossche rounding out the podium with bronze.

Havik, 31, was the only rider to lap the field three times in separate attacks. He defended his position on the final laps to claim an emotional first world title.

The Dutchman was part of an early breakaway, following a move from the USA's Grant Koontz along with Van Den Bossche, Mykyta Yakovlev (Ukraine). Britain's William Parrett blazed across and dragged the five riders to the field to take the first lap.

He then entered another move when Kluge attacked to form a six-rider move that took a lap along with Van Den Bossche, Parrett, Corbin Strong (New Zealand) and Gustav Johansson (Sweden). The 20 points bonus briefly moved Strong into the lead.

However, the Kiwi missed the move when eight riders went clear in the closing 30 laps with Kluge and Havik taking advantage of the absence of Strong and Van Den Bossche to move up in the standings.

The cagey German snatched enough sprint points to climb over Strong, Perrett and Van Den Bossche by winning the last two sprints but Havik made sure he couldn't take a lap, chasing him down with 10 laps remaining.

Women's Sprint

Mathilde Gros gives France their first rainbows in women's sprint

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Mathilde Gros gave France their first rainbow jersey of the 2022 Track Worlds, stunning the German favourites first in the semifinal, where she toppled Emma Hinze, and then in the gold medal round, where she deposed Lea Friedrich in two straight races.

Hinze prevailed over Laurine van Riessen (Netherlands) in the bronze medal round.

The crowd erupted in cheers for the 23-year-old as she celebrated winning the final event of the evening.

Friedrich qualified fastest, but Gros was not far behind and sailed through the next rounds of racing. She handily defeated Britain's Sophie Capewell in the quarterfinal but faced a heavily favoured Hinze in the semifinal.

But, taking the lead from the front and sprinting long, Gros held off her German rival to move onto the gold medal round and, employing the same unbeatable tactic, repeated the effort against Friedrich to win the title.

Men's Kilometre TT

Hoogland adds to Dutch tally in kilometre

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Jeffrey Hoogland gave the Netherlands their third gold medal and seventh podium of the UCI Track World Championships on Friday, beating home favourite Melvin Landerneau (France) and Alejandro Martinez Chorro (Spain) in the final to defend his title.

Hoogland, second in the men's keirin on Thursday, had few problems taking the third kilometre title of his career, beating Landerneau by 1.4 seconds.