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World Junior Track Championships - CM
Los Angeles, USA, July 28-August 1, 2004
Men Madison 30 km
Aussies too strong
By Kristy Scrymgeour
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Miles Olman and Matt Goss paired up tonight to dominate the Madison and earn a sixth Gold medal for Australia and a second gold medal for themselves. Coming off a win in last nights team pursuit, the duo were both excited to be actually selected for the event let alone win another Gold.
Undoubtedly the most exciting spectator race on the track, the Madison was again a crowd pleaser tonight and action filled right from the gun. From a few nasty crashes in the early laps to the very close fight for the silver medal in the final sprint, the crowd was on the edge of their seats from start to finish.
Within ten laps of starting, a crash on the back side of the track saw a French and a Swiss rider go down as the riders got used to each other on the track. Both were ok and were back in the race before long. Soon after it was the Belgian team of Tim Mertens and Tim Roels to take the first sprint from the Australians, with Russia taking the points for third.
Another crash put the British team out of the race, with one of their riders flipping over his bike and landing hard on his shoulder. The pace was very fast and teams were getting dropped early on. Australia won the second sprint from France and Germany, putting them in the lead and from here they never looked back.
Germany and France were very aggressive making regular attacks and the Aussie team stayed consistently near the front. "It turned out to be a dangerous race," said Goss after the race, "but we managed to stay at the front and out of trouble."
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The Belgians agreed with this strategy. "It was very dangerous, so our coach told us to stay at the front," said Mertens. "It was very important, not only for this but because when Australia, France and Germany were attacking, we needed to be there."
Australia continued to increase their lead, placing in every sprint and in the end it was a fight for the Silver medal. With only one sprint remaining France and Belgium were on equal points and Germany were very close behind. Australia attacked hard with a few laps to go and Germany quickly bridged forcing France and Belgium to chase. In the final sprint, Germany came second to Australia, but the battle for silver was won by the Belgians, who took third in the finishing sprint. Germany's final sprint tied them with France in points and the tiebreaker was given to France because they had placed first in the third sprint of the day and Germany didn't win any.
The Australians were very happy again with Olman saying another medal felt "unreal." "I was a bit tired today,"he added, "but Matty had really good legs so I just tried to put him in the best position I could for the sprints."
With three sprints to go the pair raced for the win. "Matty said to me 'if we win this sprint, we've got it' and then we rode past Gary [Sutton] who said 'You're world champions if you win this one.' So the Chileans led it out and I got Matt in position and he came through." Added Olman. "It was perfect timing," said Goss.
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Goss and Olman have trained a lot together for this race but have never actually raced a Madison together. Their plan was simply to get as many early points as possible and then to stay up the front and out of trouble. Goss was excited with his second gold medal of the week. "I didn't expect to come in and win tonight," he said. "I had high expectations for the team pursuit, but I'm just happy I got to ride the Madison."
The Belgians were also happy with their silver saying simply that "the Australians were too strong for us tonight."
"Normally, out plan was for me to do the sprints and for Tim [Mertens] to make the race hard," explained Roels, "but today the Australians made the race hard and we followed."
"He's the smart one," laughed Mertens of his teammate. "I just ride and keep riding."
The Belgians knew they had to get it right on the final sprint to beat France and take the silver medal. "It was a very close sprint," said Mertens, "I was sixth wheel and I went directly to the wheel in front of me and we did a perfect change."
"It was perfect timing," added Roels.
Photography
Images by Mitch Friedman Photography
- Handsling Italian style demonstrated by Jacopo Guarnieri and Daniele Menaspa
- Reach out and touch someone - Team Korea (Kang Dong Jin/Joo Hyun Wook) swaps
- Matt Goss (Australia) leads the peloton in the Madison
- Team Germany (Marcel Barth/Sascha Damrow) changes over
- Team Chile (Juan Bravo/Luis Mansilla) gets back in with a sling
- Miles Olman and Matt Goss (Australia) execute an exchange in the Madison
- Team Russia (Sergey Kolesnikov/Ivan Kovalev) gets back into teh action after a crash
- Austria and Russia do the synchro sling
- Sascha Damrow reaches for Marcel Barth (Germany)
- It's not supposed to be fun! Team Netherlands (Lars Jun/Patrick Kos) enjoying themselves far too much.
- Michael Chauner (USA) looking woozy after a crash - he subsequently pulled out.
- Germany's Marcel Barth congratulates the Aussie winning duo
Results
1 Australia (Matthew Goss/Miles Olman) 26 pts 2 Belgium (Tim Mertens/Tim Roels) 12 3 France (Besson Jérémy/Tuanua Zahn) 11 4 Germany (Marcel Barth/Sascha Damrow) 11 5 Russia (Sergey Kolesnikov/Ivan Kovalev) 6 6 Switzerland (Maxime Bally/Alain Lauener) 7 Chile (Juan Bravo/Luis Mansilla) 8 Austria (Stefan Patzl/Georg Tazreiter) One lap behind 9 Czech Republic (Vojtech Hacecky/Jiri Hochmann) 10 Netherlands (Lars Jun/Patrick Kos) 11 Korea (Kang Dong Jin/Joo Hyun Wook) Two laps behind 12 Kazakhstan (Yevgeniy Maximov/Alexey Zaitsev) DNF Great Britian (Geraint Thomas/Thomas Walters) DNF Italy (Jacopo Guarnieri/Daniele Menaspa) DNF New Zealand (Adam Coker/Matthew Haydock) DNF USA (Michael Chauner/Daniel Holloway) Sprints 100 to go 1 Belgium 5 pts 2 Australia 3 3 Germany 2 4 Russia 1 5 Switzerland 80 to go 1 Australia 5 pts 2 France 3 3 Germany 2 4 Russia 1 5 Switzerland 60 to go 1 France 5 pts 2 Australia 3 3 Belgium 2 4 Russia 1 5 Germany 40 to go 1 Australia 5 pts 2 Belgium 3 3 Germany 2 4 France 1 5 Russia 20 to go 1 Australia 5 pts 2 Russia 3 3 Germany 2 4 France 1 5 Belgium Final 1 Australia 5 pts 2 Germany 3 3 Belgium 2 4 France 1 5 Switzerland
