January 15, 2016 (Hong Kong) – Jasmin Glaesser took home silver in the women’s Points Race delivering Canada’s first medal on day one of the final round of the UCI Track Cycling World Cup underway in Hong Kong. The BC rider finished four points behind winner Jolien D’Hoore (Belgium) with Emily Nelson (Great Britain) in third.

The Canadian Women’s Team Pursuit squad, currently ranked #1 in the World Cup rankings, posted the third fastest time in their qualifying round. The squad included Laura Brown, Annie Foreman-Mackey, Stephanie Roorda and Georgia Simmerling – Glaesser, Kirsti Lay and Allison Beveridge sat out as Cycling Canada assesses more riders for long term planning. Great Britain and the USA were the fastest teams and now Canada will face off against the Americans in their quest to make the gold medal final. The race marked the World Cup debut of former alpine skier, Georgia Simmerling, and she exceeded expectations.

The Men’s Team Pursuit squad consisting of Remi Pelletier-Roy, Sean MacKinnon, Aidan Caves and Adam Jamieson was 12th and did not advance. The team experienced difficulties at the start, and had a hard time recovering. The four-man squad is hoping to remain in contention for World Championships qualification as the riders continue to gain experience and develop towards Tokyo 2020. MacKinnon and Caves also competed in the Points and Scratch races, respectively.

Meanwhile Canada’s women’s Team Sprint, the Calgary-based pair of Monique Sullivan and Kate O’Brien, posted the fourth fastest qualifying time of 33.620s in the women’s team sprint – Canada’s best ever result in the event.

The duo will race for the bronze medal on Saturday against the Spanish team who qualified in third. The opportunity is there for the women to fine-tune their strategy going into the medal round and post an even faster time in the finale.

“The girls have worked extremely hard to get to this point and I could not be more proud of their focus, fortitude, and grace under pressure in a must-do situation. Our objective for the past year has been to chip away at the points we needed to break into the top nine teams that will qualify for the Olympics,” said Erin Hartwell, Canada’s track sprint coach.

“Today put us into the driver’s seat and one step closer to getting both Monique and Kate to Rio. It’s wonderful to be racing for a medal tomorrow as we’ve qualified into the top four for the first time. However, regardless of immediate success, we will forge on with the mindset and process-driven approach that has brought us to this position. Under no circumstance will we let our collective guard down in our grind to the Games. Nevertheless, I’ll admit I’m somewhat happy today…,” he added.

The Women’s Team Pursuit and Women’s Team Sprint medal rounds will take place Saturday. The Canadian women, who won gold in this event at the 2015 PanAm Games, could make history on Saturday. Canada’s women team sprint has never won a World Cup or a World Championships medal.

“We are assessing our athletes here in different roles within the lineup, so the result is less important than how each individual athlete performs,” explains Kris Westwood, High Performance Manager for Cycling Canada. “That means in some cases the athletes are being put into unfamiliar roles, and the final result may be compromised, but in the long term it will help us perform better at the World Championships in London and in Rio.”

With files from Cycling Canada.

More photos below.

Results

Women’s Points Race
1. Jolien D’Hoore (Belgium) 17 pts
2. Jasmin Glaesser (Canada) 13
3. Emily Nelson (Great Britain) 11
4. Ina Savenka (Belarus) 8
5. Ganna Solovei (Ukraine) 7
6. Edita Mazureviciute (Lithuania) 7
7. Minami Uwano (Japan) 7
8. Gulnaz Badykova (Russua) 5
9. Caroline Ryan (Ireland) 5
10. Yao Pang (Hong Kong) 5
11. Elena Cecchini (Italy) 2
12. Stephanie Pohl (Germany) 0
DNF Edyta Jasinska (Poland)

Women’s Team Pursuit

Qualifications
1. Great Britain 4:19.369
Laura Trott
Elinor Barker
Ciara Horne
Joanna Rowsell-Shand

2. United States 4:23.696
Sarah Hammer
Chloe Dygert
Jennifer Valente
Ruth Winder

3. Canada 4:23.790
Laura Brown
Annie Foreman-Mackey
Stephanie Roorda
Georgia Simmerling

4. China 4:27.242
Dong Yan Huang
Yali Jing
Menglu Ma
Baofang Zhao

5. New Zealand 4:31.287
Holly Edmondston
Bryony Botha
Michaela Drummond
Philippa Sutton

6. Italy 4:31.498
Simona Frapporti
Elisa Balsamo
Beatrice Bartelloni
Francesca Pattaro

7. Germany 4:32:511
Stephanie Pohl
Charlotte Becker
Mieke Kroger
Gudrun Stock

8. Poland 4:33.906
Malgorzata Wojtyra
Edyta Jasinska
Justyna Kaczkowska
Natalia Rutkowska

9. Belarus 4:34.604
Ina Savenka
Katsiaryna Piatrouskaya
Polina Pivovarova
Marina Shmayankova

10. Ireland 4:35.777
Caroline Ryan
Lydia Boylan
Josie Knight
Melanie Spath

11. Hong Kong 4:37.536
Yao Pang
Bo Yee Leung
Zhao Juan Meng
Qianyu Yang

12. Russia 4:38.567
Evgeniya Romanyuta
Gulnaz Badykova
Alexandra Goncharova
Tamara Balabolina

13. Australia 4:38.984
Elissa Wundersitz
Nicola MacDonald
Alexandra Manly
Danielle McKinnirey

14. Japan 4:40.257
Sakura Tsukagoshi
Minami Uwano
Kisato Nakamura
Kie Furuyama

Qualification rule:
The eight teams recording the best times in the qualifying round will be matched in the First round as follows:
The 6th fastest team against the 7th fastest team.
The 5th fastest team against the 8th fastest team.
The 2nd fastest team against the 3rd fastest team.
The fastest team against the 4th fastest team.
All the teams from the First round dispute the Finals.
The winners of heats 3 and 4 in the First round ride the final for the gold and silver medals.
The remaining six teams will be ranked by their times in the First round and will be paired as follows:
The two fastest teams ride the final for the bronze medal.
The next two fastest teams ride the final for 5th and 6th places.
The final two teams ride the final for 7th and 8th places.
The heats will be ridden in the reverse of this order.

Men’s Team Pursuit

Qualifications
1. Australia 4:00.947
Sam Welsford
Alexander Porter
Miles Scotson
Rohan Wight

2. Denmark 4:02.264
Niklas Larsen
Frederik Madsen
Casper Pedersen
Rasmus Pedersen

3. Italy 4:02.545
Simone Consonni
Michele Scartezzini
Filippo Ganna
Francesco Lamon

4. Germany 4:02.687
Henning Bommel
Leif Lampater
Leon R. Rohde
Domenic Weinstein

5. China 4:04.144
Hao Liu
Yang Fan
Chen Lu Qin
Pingan Shen

6. Great Britain 4:05.015
Mark Cavendish
Oliver Wood
Kian Emadi
Christopher Latham

7. Netherlands 4:05.247
Jenning Huizenga
Roy Pieters
Nick Stopler
Joost Van Der Burg

8. Russia 4:05.405
Viktor Manakov
Sergei Shilov
Dmitrii Sokolov
Kirill Sveshnikov

9. New Zealand 4:06.809
Dylan Kennett
Luke Mudgway
Marc Ryan
Thomas Sexton

10. Switzerland 4:07.033
Claudio Imhof
Loic Perizzolo
Martin Schappi
Cyrille Thiery

11. Colombia 4:07.508
Juan Esteban Arango Carvajal
Arles Castro Laverde
Jordan Arley Parra Arias
Weimar Alfonso Roldan Ortiz

12. Canada 4:07.611
Remi Pelletier-Roy
Sean MacKinnon
Aidan Caves
Adam Jamieson    

13. France 4:07.877
Benjamin Thomas
Clement Barbeau
Aurelien Costeplane
Florian Maitre

14. Spain 4:09.814
Julio Alberto Amores Palacios
Xavier Canellas Sanchez
Vicente Garcia De Mateos Rubio
Illart Zuazubiskar Gallastegi

15. Ukraine 4:17.130
Vladyslav Kreminskyi
Roman Gladysh
Oleksandr Moshchonskiy
Taras Shevchuk

16. Hong Kong 4:17.163
King Wai Cheung
Siu Wai Ko
Ka Yu Leung
Maximilian Gil Mitchelmore

17. Uzbekistan 4:21.121
Ruslan Fedorov
Andrey Izmaylov
Vadim Shaekhov
Roman Shukurov

Women’s Team Sprint

Qualifications
1. RusVelo  32.839
Daria Shmeleva
Anastasiia Voinova

2. Great Britain 33.496
Katy Marchant
Jessica Varnish

3. Spain 33.538
Tania Calvo Barbero
Helena Casas Roige

4. Canada 33.620   
Kate O’Brien
Monique Sullivan

5. New Zealand 33.859
Natasha Hansen
Katie Schofield

6. France 33.914
Sandie Clair
Olivia Montauban

7. China 33.999
Shuang Guo
Lin Junhong

8. Australia 34.121
Kaarle McCulloch
Caitlin Ward

9. Russia 34.369
Ekaterina Gnidenko
Viktoria Tyumneva

10. Germany 34.495
Pauline Sophie Grabosch
Emma Hinze

11. Mexico 34.621
Daniela Gaxiola Gonzalez Luz
Jessica Salazar Valles

12. Netherlands 34.708
Kyra Lamberink
Hetty Van De Wouw

13. Ukraine 34.795
Liubov Basova
Olena Starikova

14. Colombia 34.823
Martha Bayona Pineda
Juliana Gaviria Rendon

15. Japan 35.661
Takako Ishii
Mai Kajita

Fastest 2 teams race for Gold and 3rd and 4th teams race for Bronze.

Men’s Points Race
1. Benjamin Thomas (France)  33 pts
2. Julio Alberto Amores Palacios (Spain)  23 (-1 lap)
3. Luke Mudgway (New Zealand)  21 (-1 lap)
4. Jasper De Buyst (Belgium)  17 (-1 lap)
5. Claudio Imhof (Switzerland)  11 (-1 lap)
6. Artur Ershov (RusVelo)  11 (-1 lap)
7. Felix English (Ireland)  10 (-1 lap)
8. King Lok Cheung (Hong Kong)  10 (-1 lap)
9. Sean MacKinnon (Canada)  7 (-1 lap)      
10. Juan Esteban Arango Carvajal (Colombia)  4 (-1 lap)
11. Michele Scartezzini (Italy)  4 (-1 lap)
DNF Chao Hua Xue (China)
DNF Vladyslav Kreminskyi (Ukraine)
DNF Ruslan Fedorov (Uzbekistan)

Men’s Scratch Race
1. Benjamin Thomas (France)
2. Xavier Canellas Sanchez (Spain)
3. Jordan Arley Parra Arias (Colombia)
4. Felix English (Ireland)
5. Chao Hua Xue (China)
6. King Lok Cheung (Hong Kong)
7. Adrian Teklinski (Poland)
8. Ignacio Prado (Mexico)
9. Andrey Sazanov (RusVelo)
10. Campbell Stewart (New Zealand)
11. Germain Burton (Great Britain)
12. Francesco Lamon (Italy)
13. Daniel Hartvig (Denmark)
14. Loic Perizzolo (Switzerland)
15. Jasper De Buyst (Belgium)
DNF Aidan Caves (Canada)
DNF Roman Gladysh (Ukreaine)
DNF Timur Yambulatov (Uzbekistan)