WomensCycling.net - race coverage, Melbourne World Cup Track

The New Zealand trio continued their form from qualifying to win the gold medal. The British team, lagged behind right from the start and could not match the speed of the New Zealanders.

In the fight for bronze, the young Australian team never looked troubled by the Ukrainians. The are all struggling with minor injuries but dug deep to win the medal.

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Post Race Comments

Alison Shanks, Rushlee Buchanan and Lauren Ellis (NZL) was very happy with the team's win. "We've spent a good couple of weeks in training camp and have a really good squad going now; we put out a solid ride this morning but there were so many things we knew we could improve on. We started a bit harder and it was just a case of even splits and much smoother riding," said Shanks. Asked if Great Britain's world record mark of 3.21.875 could be achieved by the world championships in Copenhagen next March, Shanks replied, "Totally. There's still a good four months or so before worlds and thats a long time. Were just really starting our track season here."

Rushlee Buchanan was all smiles after completing their gold medal ride, "Lauren [Ellis] miss the last change but we were still able to bring it home. The girls just rode so well. We looked at the video from this morning and knew we could improve. We missed a change and had to pull hard to get back together. I knew we could do it," said Buchanan.

Joanne Rowsell, Wendy Houvenaghel and Katie Colclough (GBR) were not the gold medal team from Poland World championships or the world record breaking team from Manchester, but they still pushed the Kiwi's to the line. Rowsell reflected on their ride, "This morning I missed one of my changes, this morning just as Wendy was driving for home. This event was about giving a new member experience. We achieved our goals in Manchester with the world record, so this was about experience not results," said Rowsell.

Josie Tomic

, Sarah Kent and Ashlee Ankudinoff (AUS) were very happy with Bronze, Tomic reflected on the day, "The qualifying was our second fastest time ever and then in the final we went faster so now that is our second fastest time as well so pretty happy for this time of the year and the best thing is that we are slowly closing the gap between ourselves and the Brits and the New Zealand riders and for such a young team without a big driver like they have (Wendy) Houvenaghel and the Kiwi’s have (Alison) Shanks it pretty awesome to be within a second and I am sure after a bit more experience together we will be able to get t hem."

"We are just waiting to see what the decision is for the teams pursuit and omnium [in the Olympics], hopefully it goes through and I think when it does we will put a lot more emphasis on the teams pursuit and I am really excited, I think we have a good chance to do something special by the time London comes around, " said Tomic.

Sarah Kent, has struggled with a back injury all year and was a little disappointed not to make the final. "It is sweet, we got bronze in world too. We are young and we are all carrying injuries so we hope to be fully fit by Copenhagen to bring home the gold," said Kent.

I guess when you look at it everyone rode faster than they did in the qualifying so I guess they beat us again in the final so they were the better teams today. Not really disappointed at all today, of course you want to win but I am just happy that we are slowly chipping away. In Manchester they beat us by seven seconds so it’s less than two now so it’s pretty good.

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Results

Position	Name		Country/Team	Time	km/hr
Gold	BUCHANAN	Rushlee	New Zealand	3:24.771	52.741
	ELLIS	Lauren
	SHANKS	Alison
Silver	COLCLOUGH	Katie	Great Britain	3:25.938	52.442
	HOUVENAGHEL	Wendy
	ROWSELL	Joanna
Bronze	ANKUDINOFF	Ashlee	Australia	3:26.869	52.206
	KENT	Sarah
	TOMIC	Josephine
4	GALYUK	Svitlana	Ukraine	3:30.156	51.39
	KALITOVSKA	Lesya
	SHPYLOVA	Iryna

5	Germany
6	Belgium
7	Netherlands
8	RODIN
9	United States
10	Italy
11	Korea

World Cup Standings

Position	Country/Team	Manchester	Melbourne	Total
1	GREAT BRITAIN	12	10	22
2	GERMANY	10	6	16
3	AUSTRALIA	8	8	16
4	NEW ZEALAND		12	12
5	NETHERLANDS	7	4	11
6	BELGIUM	6	5	11
7	UKRAINE		7	7
8	FRANCE	5		5
9	RUSSIA	4		4
10	RODIN		3	3
11	LITHUANIA	3		3
12	UNITED STATES		2	2
13	POLAND	2		2
14	ITALY		1	1
15	GRUPPO SPORTIVO FIAMME AZZURRE	1		1

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