Daniell is on track for a bright future

ONE of Britain’s big cycling hopes for the future, teenager David Daniell, produced a brief and encouraging gasp of surprise at the World Track Championships here last night.

BRITISH HOPE Daniell was a big surprise BRITISH HOPE: Daniell was a big surprise

Daniell, 19, produced a quick time in the first half of the kilo time-trial event, running faster than German rider Stefan Nimke, whose winning time of 1min 0.666secs was a sea-level world record.

But Daniell had got his strategy a little wrong. He was too quick in that opening spell for his own good and faded for a still highly creditable time of 1min 2.316secs.That meant he finished seventh.

But it was a performance that revealed his fabulous potential as a potential long-term successor to Sir Chris Hoy, who made his name in this kilo event before switching to the sprints and keirin, when the kilo was withdrawn as an Olympic discipline.

Daniell clearly has a massive future in track cycling, as does 18-year-old American Taylor Phinney, who was a little quicker than the Brit here.

Phinney had won the men’s individual pursuit on Thursday evening and followed that with a silver.

The GB men’s pursuit team narrowly failed to reach the final of the event that Britain dominated at the Beijing Olympics last summer, breaking the world record with what many experts thought was the perfect ride.

It was not a surprise to the coaches, given that three of the four Olympic riders were missing, including Bradley Wiggins and Geraint Thomas, who were left out of the championships to see how their younger team-mates would fare.

The GB quartet of Jonny Bellis, Steven Burke, Ed Clancy and Peter Kennaugh went close but finished third in the qualifying competition, two-tenths of a second behind Australia.

Denmark also reached the final, while the Brits faced a race-off for the bronze with New Zealand.

Kennaugh was impressive, a welcome sign ahead of today’s final of the Madison event, where he will be paired with Mark Cavendish. “Cav was fabulous in the Scratch race on Thursday night. It didn’t quite work out for him then, but he was looking great,” said Great Britain’s performance director Dave Brailsford .

“It’s excellent to have him back in the track team. He’s here because he wants to be. We welcomed him with open arms.

“He’s a fun guy to have around, but his attention to detail and thinking about winning and being the best he can is phenomenal.”

Lizzie Armitstead had to settle for silver in the women’s scratch race.

Victoria Pendleton cruised through the qualifiers yesterday for the women’s individual sprint, the discipline in which she is the Olympic champion.

She was 0.14secs off the world record in one of the qualifying races .

After a bronze and silver here, Pendleton is determined to win gold in tonight’s final.‘We will welcome him back’

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