UCI Cycling World Championships 2023: GB begin with two gold and two bronze medals

Great Britain won two golds, a silver and two bronze medals on day one at the Cycling World Championships in Glasgow.

Earlier Team GB collected gold and bronze in the women’s B 1km time trial.

Germany pipped Great Britain to gold in the women’s elite team sprint with both teams beating the previous world record in the final.

A great finale race on day one

Tidball edged out Japan’s Kazushige Kuboki in a frantic finish with Dutch rider Tuur Dens taking bronze.

Tidball became the first Briton to be crowned world champion at the men’s scratch since Ben Swift won in Melbourne in 2012.

The 23-year-old former European under-23 champion saw his chances fading when Switzerland’s Alex Vogel broke away from the peloton with four laps to go.

But the Briton latched on to Dens’ wheel on the final lap, overtaking Vogel inside the final 200 metres, before sprinting around the Dutchman for victory.

GB win women’s B time trial Gold and Bronze

Team GB’s first medals of the championship came in the women’s B 1km time trial with Sophie Unwin and pilot Jenny Holl claiming gold and Jordan Elizabeth and Amy Cole winning bronze.

Unwin and Holl were more than a second down on Jessica Gallagher and Caitlin Ward of Australia with a lap to go but beat the Australians to first place by 0.060 seconds.

The British pair had won bronze in the event last year and are the defending category B individual pursuit champions.

They qualified fastest and, setting the last time of the final, dramatically edged out Gallagher and Ward who had beaten Unwin to gold at the 1km time trial at the 2022 Commonwealth Games in Birmingham.

Elizabeth and Cole beat compatriots Lora Fachie and Corrine Hall who came fourth.

Germany and GB set blistering times in sprint final

In the women’s elite sprint Britain were edged out by Germany despite posting the world’s second fastest time.

Sadly for Emma Finucane, Sophie Capewell and Lauren Bell defending champions Germany posted the fastest just 0.075 seconds earlier.

Lea Friedrich, Pauline Grabosch and Emma Hinze’s winning time was 0.119 quicker than the world record they set in 2022.

The trio have now won the team sprint at the last three world championships together, four years ago Grabosch and Hinze won gold as a pair after Friedrich had raced in qualifying.

GB win men’s B individual pursuit bronze

Elsewhere on Thursday Stephen Bates and Christopher Latham beat fellow Britons Chris McDonald and Adam Duggleby in the men’s B individual pursuit bronze medal race.

But there was heartbreak for Team GB’s Neah Evans with the Scot pipped to bronze by New Zealand’s Bryony Botha in the women’s elite individual pursuit.

Briton Sam Ruddock finished fourth in the men’s C1 individual pursuit, eight seconds behind China’s Weicong Liang in the third-placed race.

Ryan Taylor of Briton also finished fourth after he was comfortably beaten by bronze medal winner Shota Kawamoto of Japan in the men’s C2 individual pursuit.

Republic of Ireland’s Ronan Grimes won bronze in the men’s C4 Individual pursuit, beating France’s Gatien Le Rousseau in his bronze medal race.

And in the men’s C5 scratch race British riders William Bjergfelt and Blaine Hunt finished fourth and sixth respectively.

Earlier in the day, defending champions Great Britain crashed out of the men’s team pursuit with rider Charlie Tanfield was taken to hospital following a fall in the qualification round.