January 21, 2007 (Los Angeles, USA) — An 11th place finish could signal the end of the Canadian men’s team sprint program, at least until after the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics. The trio of Cam Mackinnon, Yannik Morin and Travis Smith finished 11th, 5/10 of second slower than the time they would have needed to meet their ultimatum goal of placing 8th.

Great Britain was fastest in qualifying ahead of France and, in testament to the UK’s sprinting strength, British pro team, ScienceinSport.com (SIS), was third ahead of Germany. All four teams will ride in the final later today.

Four Canadians took to the boards this morning attempting to qualify for this evening’s Madison final. Of the four only Martin Gilbert has any significant experience in the event (though his partner, McKenzie rode with Bell at the Pan-Am Champs last year).

The Symmetrics duo of Christian Meier and Cam Evans failed to qualify despite spirited riding on their part, in what was by all measures a very fast heat, punctuated by several crashes.

Gilbert and McKenzie met with more success however, riding a tactically and technically executed race to qualify through to the next round.

Despite being nearly twice as long, the Madison final was even faster than the heats were, averaging a blistering 54.7 kph.

Denmark suffered a meltdown last night in the team pursuit, coming unglued in the last kilometer and losing the final to Ukraine. Michael Morkov and Alex Rasmussen took vengence for that loss in the Madison final. The pair lapped the field and finished 14 points clear of second place Belgium. The Danish endurance team is competing aboard Canadian Cervelo new carbon P3T’s, continuing the Danish team/Canadian bike relationship of Pro Tour team CSC.

The Canadian team of Ryan McKenzie and Martin Gilbert rode gamely to finish 12th of 16 teams in the final, ahead of such perennial powerhouses like Great Britain, France and Austria.


Qualifying
1. Great Britain (Matthew Crampton, Chris Hoy, Jamie Staff) 44.565
2. France (Gregory Bauge, Fran?ois Pervis, Kevin Sireau) 44.723
3. Scienceinsport.Com (Ross Edgar, Jason Kenny, Jason Queally) 44.995
4. Germany (Carsten Bergemann, Robert Forstemann, Rene Wolff) 45.189
5. Australia (Scott Sunderland, Daniel Ellis, Jason Niblett) 45.661
6. Poland (Maciej Bielecki, Lukasz Kwiatkowski, Damian Zielinski) 46.133
7. Japan (Kazuya Narita, Yudai Nitta, Yusho Oikawa) 46.205
8. China (Lin Feng, Wu Dan, Zhang Lei) 46.456
9. United States (Adam Duvendeck, Gideon Massie, Kevin Selker) 46.647
10. Spain (Itmar Esteban Herraiz, Hodei Mazquiaran Uria, Salvador Melia Mangrinan) 46.976
11. Canada (Cam Mackinnon, Yannik Morin, Travis Smith) 47.023
12. Greece (Konstantinos Iordanidis, Vasileios Reppas, Kostantinos Troulinos) 47.031
13. Malaysia (Md. Edrus Md. Yunos, Josiah Ng Onn Lam, Mohd Rizal Tisin) 47.083
14. Cuba (Ahmed Lopez, Yasmani Pol Rodriguez, Alexis Sotolongo) 47.225
15. Russia (Anton Rudoy, Mikhail Shikhalev, Stoian Vasev) 47.463
16. Switzerland (Fabian Keiser, Roger Rinderknecht, Cedric Stoller) 47.716
17. Trinidad &Tobago (Azikiwe Kellar, Haseem Mclean, Christopher Sellier) 48.859
18. Slovakia (Peter Bazalik, Jaroslav Jerabek, Martin Liska) 49.504
19. Puerto Rico (Eduardo Colon Ortiz, Roberto Alvarado Torres, Luis Arocho) 51.936

Madison Qualifiers

Heat 1
Elapsed time: 22:13.970 Average Speed: 53.974 Km/h

1. France
2. Moscow
3. Belgium
4. Austria
5. Netherlands
6. Italy
7. Spain
8. Canada (Gilbert/McKenzie)
9. Slovakia
10. Team TiaaCref
11. Hong Kong
12. Mexico
13. ArdaNatura Pinarello Ukraina
DNS Team 100% Me

Heat 2
Time: 22:22.900 Average Speed: 53.615 Km/h

1. Russia
2. Czech Republic
3. Denmark
4. Ukraine
5. Argentina
6. Great Britain
7. Germany
8. Cespa Eustrak.Com
9. Australia
10. Belarus
11. United States
12. New Zealand
13. Symmetrics Cycling Team (Evans/Meier)
14. Poland

Final
Time: 43:50.110 Average Speed: 54.750 Km/h

1. Denmark
2. Belgium
3. Russia
4. Argentina
5. Ukraine
6. Italy
7. Netherlands
8. Moscow
9. Spain
10. Czech Republic
11. Germany
12. Canada
13. Great Britain
14. Austria
15. Cespa Eustrak.Com
16. France