Great Britain Women Breaks World Record

 

Great Britain's women's pursuit team broke the world record on the way to qualifying fastest on the opening day of track cycling at the Olympic Games. Laura Trott, Joanna Rowsell Shand, Elinor Barker and Katie Archibald stopped the clock in an outstanding 4min 13.260sec to regain the record they lost to Australia in February 2015 and announce themselves as favourites for gold in Rio.

The United States, who are the reigning world champions, qualified second fastest but were a distant 1.02 seconds slower, while the Australians qualified third fastest but were almost six seconds down on the rampant British quartet.

Britain will now line up against Canada in the last of the four first-round heats on Saturday afternoon, while Australia will face the United States in the third heat. The fastest two teams from the four heats will progress to the gold-medal final on Saturday evening, with the third and fourth-fastest teams going into the bronze-medal final.