November 19, 2006 (Sydney, Australia) – Four gold medals from Australia’s women and consistent performances across the board has seen Australia top the nation rankings at the end of the first round of the UCI Track Cycling World Cup Classics at Sydney’s Dunc Gray Velodrome.

Australia amassed 103 points to finish four points clear of defending series champions, the Netherlands, after 16 events over three days.

The highlight of the round was undoubtedly the world record ride by Queensland’s Anna Meares who posted a time of 33.944sec for the 500m time trial eclipsing the time she set to win gold at the Athens Olympic Games. She claimed a second gold medal when she teamed with sister Kerrie Meares in the women’s teams sprint while Victorian Katie Mactier took home the gold in the 3km individual pursuit. Sydney’s Kate Bates kicked off the Australians medal haul on the opening night with victory in the points race.

In the men’s events Olympic and Commonwealth Games Champion, Ryan Bayley (SouthAustralia.com-AIS), collected silver in the keirin and Victorian Phillip Thuaux (Drapac-Porsche) finished third in the 4km individual pursuit. Of the visitors Russia’s Olympic points race champion, Mikhail Ignatiev, was also a stand out clinching three gold medals in the points race, teams pursuit and Madison events.

But the final day of competition wasn’t kind to Kerrie Meares who crashed heavily in the second round of the keirin after her back tyre exploded. She landed hard on her left knee and collected splinters and track burn in the fall. The 24 year old may now be in doubt for the Oceania Championships which begin in Melbourne this Thursday. Kerrie was sitting in second wheel behind sister Anna heading into the final 100 metres when the crash happened.

“From what I remember the Chinese girl (Shuang Guo who received an official warning after the race) was crowding down on me and I accelerated to stay on Anna’s wheel but went a little too fast,” said Kerrie whose front wheel overlapped her sister’s rear wheel. “I was trying to pull back a bit to control my speed but my rear tyre blew up and I couldn’t hold it.”

Australian Head Coach, Martin Barras, said the Australians came to Sydney with the goal of being competitive in at least six or seven events.

“We can see from the medals and performances that we have achieved that goal but it was a case of hits and misses over the three days,” said Barras. “The hits were obviously the women, (Anna) Meares, Bates and Mactier but some of the men posted impressive performances as well.

“Ryan Bayley (silver) and Mark French (second across the line but relegated to sixth by officials) rode well in the keirin final and French put in a solid showing in the sprint (placed 4th),” said Barras. “In today’s teams sprint competition Shane Perkins and French were the two fastest starting riders over the first lap of all the riders in the competition and the junior sprinters, Daniel Ellis and Scott Sunderland showed promise.”

Barras says one of the misses was by the gun teams pursuit line up of reigning World Champions Steven Wooldridge, Peter Dawson and Mark Jamieson with new recruit Michael Ford (SouthAustralia.com-AIS) who failed to make the medal round in the event. They were also half a second slower in qualifying than the younger Australian national team quartet of Zakkari Dempster, Richard England, Hayden Joseksi and Cameron Meyer who were the fifth fastest qualifiers.

“They’ve taken it on the chin and I think you’ll see them back on top the next time they take the line,” said Barras.

The second round of the series will be raced in Moscow from December 15th to 17th.

Results Day 3

Morning Session

Womens Scratch Qualifying – heat 1

1 Alena Prudnikova (Russia)
2 Rochelle Gilmore (Australia)
3 Theresa Cliff-Ryan (United States)
4 Catherine Cheatley (New Zealand)
5 Marllijn Binnendijk (Netherlands)
6 Gina Grain (Canada)
7 Debora Galvez Lopez (Spain)
8 Wan Yiu Wong (Hong Kong)
9 Uracca Leow Hoay Sim (Malaysia)
10 Tess Downing (Australia)
11 Lesya Kalitovska (Ukraine)
12 Min Hye Lee (Korea)
13 Giorgia Bronzini (Italy)
14 Katarina Uhlarikova (Slovakia)
15 Yan Li (China)

Womens Scratch Qualifying – heat 2

1 Vera Koedooder (Netherlands)

One lap behind

2 Yulia Arustamova (Russia)
3 Hee Jung Son (Korea)
4 Leire Olaberria Dorronsoro (Spain)
5 Charlotte Becker (Germany)
6 Pascale Jeuland (France)
7 Kelly Benjamin (United States)
8 Lada Kozlikova (Czech Republic)
9 I Fang Ju (Chinese Taipei)
10 Katherine Bates (Australia)
11 Karen Verbeek (Belgium)
12 Alessandra D’Ettorre (Italy)
13 Noor Azian Alias (Malaysia)
14 Jianling Wang (China)

Men’s Madison Qualifying – heat 1

1 Russia 0 pts
Mikhail Ignatiev
Nikolai Trussov

One lap behind

2 Denmark 12
Michael Mokov
Alex Rasmussen
3 Drapac-Porsche 7
Mitchell Docker
Travis Meyer
4 France 7
Mathieu Ladagnous
Nicolas Rousseau
5 Argentina 6
Sebastian Donadio
Jorge Pi
6 I. R. Iran 5
Mehdi Sohrabi
Amir Zargari
7 Duranguesado 4
Aitor Alonso Granados
Unai Elorriaga Zubiaur
8 SouthAustralian.com-AIS 3
Peter Dawson
Michael Ford
9 Ukraine 0
Lyubomyr Polatayko
Volodymyr Rubin

Men’s Madison Qualifying – heat 2

1 Germany 8 pts
Guido Fulst
Karl-Christian Konig
2 Australia 8
Zakkari Dempster
Nicholas Sanderson
3 Poland 6
Lukasz Bujko
Rafat Ratajczyk
4 Italy 6
Angelo Ciccone
Fabio Masotti
5 Netherlands 6
Jens Mouris
Niki Terpstra
6 Chinese Taipei 5
Keng Hsien Chen
Po Hung Wu
7 Spain 3
Antonio Miguel Parra
Carlos Torrent Tarres
8 New Zealand 0
Westley Gough
Gregory Henderson
9 ISD-Sport Donetsk 2
Denys Kostyuk
Oleksandr Polivoda
10 Hong Kong 0
King Wai Cheung
Kam-Po Wong

Afternoon Session

Team World Cup Standings

1 Australia 103
2 Netherlands 99
3 Russia 90
4 Germany 75
5 France 54
6 Great Britain 50
7 Belarus 43
8 Italy 42
9 Scienceinsport.com 38
10 China 37
11 New Zealand 31
12 Korea 31
13 Ukraine 29
14 Denmark 25
15 Lithuania 22
16 Southaustralia.com – AIS 21
17 United States 18
18 Poland 18
19 Argentina 14
20 Drapac-Porsche 12
21 Spain 12
22 Switzerland 10
23 Greece 9
24 Czech Republic 7
25 Japan 7
26 Malaysia 6
27 Duranguesado 5
28 ISD-Sport Donetsk 4
29 Canada 3
30 Hong Kong 2
31 Chinese Taipei 1

Men’s Team Sprint finals

1 Great Britain 44.286 (60.967 km/h)
Ross Edgar
Chris Hoy
Craig McLean
2 Netherlands 44.511 (60.659 km/h)
Theo Bos
Teun Mulder
Tim Veldt
3 Scienceinsport.com 44.873 (60.169 km/h)
Matthew Crampton
Jason Queally
Jamie Staff
4 Southaustralia.com – AIS 45.483 (59.362 km/h)
Ryan Bayley
Shane Perkins
Scott Sunderland
5 Germany
6 France
7 Poland
8 Australia
9 China
10 Japan
11 Greece
12 Malaysia
13 United State
14 Ukraine
15 Spain
16 Russia
17 Catalunya

Women’s Keirin Final Classification

1 Shuang Guo (China)
2 Jennie Reed (United States)
3 Dana Gloss (Germany)
4 Oksana Grishina (Russia)
5 Anna Meares (Australia)
6 Elisa Frisoni (Italy)
7 Natallia Tsylinskaya (Belarus)
8 Clara Sanchez (France)
9 Jane Gerisch (Germany)
10 Lyubov Shulika (Ukraine)
11 Yvonne Hijgenaar (Netherlands)
12 Kerrie Meares (Australia)

Women’s Scratch Final

1 Vera Koedooder (Netherlands)
2 Charlotte Becker (Germany)
3 Alena Prudnikova (Russia)
4 Yulia Arustamova (Russia)
5 Rochelle Gilmore (Australia)
6 Theresa Cliff-Ryan (United States)
7 Leire Olaberria Dorronsoro (Spain)
8 Pascale Jeuland (France)
9 Wan Yiu Wong (Hong Kong)
10 Lada Kozlikova (Czech Republic)
11 Uracca Leow Hoay Sim (Malaysia)
12 Gina Grain (Canada)
13 Tess Downing (Australia)
14 Debora Galvez Lopez (Spain)
15 Hee Jung Son (Korea)
16 Catherine Cheatley (New Zealand)
17 I Fang Ju (Chinese Taipei)
18 Marllijn Binnendijk (Netherlands)
19 Katherine Bates (Australia)
DNF Kelly Benjamin (United States)

Men’s Madison Final

1 Russia 22 pts
Mikhail Ignatiev
Nikolai Trussov
2 Denmark 15
Michael Mokov
Alex Rasmussen
3 Argentina 12
Sebastian Donadio
Jorge Pi
4 Netherlands 11
Jens Mouris
Niki Terpstra
5 Italy 11
Angelo Ciccone
Fabio Masotti
6 France 5
Mathieu Ladagnous
Nicolas Rousseau
7 Drapac-Porsche 5
Mitchell Docker
Travis Meyer
8 Germany 4
Guido Fulst
Karl-Christian Konig
9 Spain 0
Antonio Miguel Parra
Carlos Torrent Tarres
10 New Zealand 0
Westley Gough
Gregory Henderson
11 Australia 2
Zakkari Dempster
Nicholas Sanderson
12 I. R. Iran 0
Mehdi Sohrabi
Amir Zargari
13 Poland 1
Lukasz Bujko
Rafat Ratajczyk
DNF Duranguesado
Aitor Alonso Granados
UnaiElorriaga Z
DNF Chinese Taipei
Keng Hsien Chen
Po Hung Wu

Women’s Keirin First Round – heat 3

1 Jennie Reed (United States)
2 Kerrie Meares (Australia)
3 Hee Jung Son (Korea)
4 Jinjie Gong (China)
5 Dana Gloss (Germany)
6 Virginie Cueff (France)
7 Tamilia Abassova (Russia)

Women’s Keirin First Round – heat 2

1 Natallia Tsylinskaya (Belarus)
2 Anna Meares (Australia)
3 Oksana Grishina (Russia)
4 Lyubov Shulika (Ukraine)
5 Annalisa Cucinotta (Italy)
6 Jane Gerisch (Germany)
7 Shuang Guo (China)

Men’s Team Sprint Qualifying

1 Great Britain 44.561 (60.591 km/h)
Ross Edgar (Great Britain)
Chris Hoy (Great Britain)
Craig Mclean (Great Britain)
2 Netherlands 44.616 (60.516 km/h)
Theo Bos (Netherlands)
Teun Mulder (Netherlands)
Tim Veldt (Netherlands)
3 Scienceinsport.com 44.675 (60.436 km/h)
Matthew Crampton (Great Britain)
Jason Queally (Great Britain)
Jamie Staff (Great Britain)
4 Southaustralia.com – AIS 45.054 (59.928 km/h)
Ryan Bayley (Australia)
Shane Perkins (Australia)
Scott Sunderland (Australia)
5 Germany 45.156 (59.792 km/h)
Carsten Bergmann (Germany)
Matthias John (Germany)
René Wolff (Germany)
6 France 45.175 (59.767 km/h)
Mickaël D’Almeida (France)
François Pervis (France)
Arnaud Tournant (France)
7 Poland 45.566 (59.254 km/h)
Maciej Bielecki (Poland)
Lukasz Kwiatkowski (Poland)
Damian Zielinski (Poland)
8 Australia 45.653 (59.141 km/h)
Daniel Ellis (Australia)
Mark French (Australia)
Joel Leonard (Australia)
9 China 45.689 (59.095 km/h)
Feng Lin (China)
Yong Feng (China)
Lei Zhang (China)
10 Japan 46.125 (58.536 km/h)
Takashi Kaneko (Japan)
Kazuya Narita (Japan)
Yusho Oikawa (Japan)
11 Greece 46.141 (58.516 km/h)
Vasileios Reppas (Greece)
Christos Volikakis (Greece)
Panagiotis Voukelatos (Greece)
12 Malaysia 46.298 (58.317 km/h)
Mohd Nasir Junaidi (Malaysia)
Josiah Ng On Lam (Malaysia)
Mohamed Rizal Tisin (Malaysia)
13 United States 46.679 (57.841 km/h)
Adam Duvendeck (United States)
Gideon Massie (United States)
Kevin Selker (United States)
14 Ukraine 46.707 (57.807 km/h)
Yevgen Bolibrukh (Ukraine)
Andrei Vynokurov (Ukraine)
Yuriy Tsyupyk (Ukraine)
15 Spain 46.711 (57.802 km/h)
Alvaro Alonso Rubio (Spain)
Hodei Mazquiaran Uria (Spain)
Salvador Melia (Spain)
16 Russia 46.813 (57.676 km/h)
Anton Rudoy (Russia)
Mikhail Shikhalev (Russia)
Stoian Vasev (Russia)
17 Catalunya 47.537 (56.797 km/h)
Angel Sixto Garcia (Spain)
Itmar Esteban Herraiz (Spain)
Jose A. Clua (Spain)

Women’s Keirin First Round – heat 1

1 Clara Sanchez (France)
2 Elisa Frisoni (Italy)
3 Jin A You (Korea)
4 Simona Krupeckaite (Lithuania)
5 Svetlana Grnkovskaya (Russia)
6 Yvonne Hijgenaar (Netherlands)
7 Victoria Pendleton (Great Britain)