Great Britain’s track cyclists took two of the five gold medals on offer on the opening day of the UCI Track Cycling World Cup Classics in Manchester yesterday, with the men’s and women’s team pursuit squads maintaining their dominance in the discipline.
In their final against Canada, the first time the women’s team pursuit has been raced at world level in the new four rider, 4,000 metre format, Olympic champions Dani King, Joanna Rowsell and Laura Trott, joined by Elinor Barker, set a new world record time of 4 minutes 19.604 seconds.
You can watch the closing stages of the final in this video.
The men’s quartet of Ed Clancy, Steven Burke, Andy Tennant and Owain Doull saw off longstanding rivals - and current world champions - Australia, just as Team GB had done in the final at London 2012.
Doull is the latest member of the squad aiming to make it three in a row at Rio in 2016, while Tennant, was the fifth member of the team pursuit line-up at London last year but didn't get a ride, meaning he missed out on a medal to his huge disappointment and frustration.
Besides Clancy and Burke, the other two riders who did win gold in London were Peter Kennaugh and Geraint Thomas - the latter has his own cause for celebration today with the announcement that he has got engaged to his girlfriend, Sara.
Here’s a montage of Friday’s action – you can find lots of other videos of yesterday’s racing on the UCI channel on YouTube.
There were medals for British cyclists in the other three events, though none was gold.
Germany’s Miriam Welte and Kristina Vogel beat the British pairing of Vicky Williamson and Becky James to win the team sprint.
But Philip Hindes, Jason Kenny and Matt Crampton – plus Kian Emadi, who had ridden in qualifying – had to settle for bronze in the men’s version, with Germany beating Russia for gold.
In the women’s points race, won by Małgorzata Wojtyra, silver went to Katie Archibald – not riding for Great Britain, however, but for Scottish Cycling.
The action continues today, with BBC Red Button coverage from 6pm.