Crash-packed day marks moment the world slipped past GB on the track
On a day that looks to have marked the end of Great Britain’s dominance of track cycling at Olympic level, there were symbols aplenty that the world has moved on, beyond the bald facts of the medal table. Dramatic crashes involving the men’s and women’s team pursuit squads closed the run of Olympic Games when one British gold medal followed another in seamless style, the hallmark of the track action in Beijing, London and Rio.
In all the chaos, the sprinter Jason Kenny became Britain’s most decorated Olympian with his eighth medal in total, a silver in the team sprint, putting him level with Bradley Wiggins; Kenny remains level with Chris Hoy on six golds. While his wife, Laura, pushed her medal tally upwards with a silver in the team pursuit, Tokyo marked the end of her remarkable unbeaten Olympic run. It will be scant consolation for an athlete of her competitive spirit but it required an astonishing world record from Germany to deny her a fifth gold in five attempts.
In a distant past, the timed disciplines on the track were relatively predictable, albeit spectacular, but Jason Kenny’s desperate fight to maintain contact with the second rider in the team sprint trio, Jack Carlin, illustrated just how close the riders have to go to their breaking point. It is barely surprising they go beyond it, which was underlined when the team pursuits produced as many crashes as might be expected in the bunch disciplines later in the week.
There was equipment failure as in the case of the Australian Alex Porter’s handlebar on day one, but apart from