Cycling: Kiwi cyclists move up a gear at World Cup meeting

The performances of New Zealand cyclists in the World Cup track meeting in Colombia have national administrators quietly excited.

The efforts of the men's pursuiters, both team and individual, the women's pursuiter Sarah Ulmer and time-trialists Matt Sinton and Fiona Ramage have been described by national selection panel convener Gordon Sharrock as "brilliant."

"It's the best we've done at a World Cup," he said.

Especially outstanding was the performance of the men's pursuit team of Gary Anderson, Lee Vertongen, Greg Henderson and Tim Carswell, who won gold after beating the Australian team by three seconds in a time of 4m 5.881s.

Track coach Ron Cheatley said he had hoped the team would have made that sort of time at last year's world championships in Berlin, but a puncture in the early stages ruined their chances.

Before last year's championships he was keen to get the team below their previous best of 4m 12s.

For the team to do such a quick time in Colombia, on limited preparation and in the middle of stamina build-up for this year's Olympic Games, was especially pleasing, Sharrock said.

Even more encouraging was the fact that some top cycling countries were represented.

"It shows the trackies are right up there," he said.

"We knew they were but Sinton, Ramage and Glen Thompson have also shown they were worthy of their nominations."

Anderson also went below 4m 30s in the individual pursuit to finish second in a time of 4m 29s.

Sinton has a 1m 3s time to his credit in the altitude of Mexico City for the 1000m time trial and finished fifth in Cali in 1m 4.119s.

Less than a second covered the top six in the women's 500m time trial, in which Ramage clocked 36.175s.

Capping the track effort was the men's road team's riding in the Tour of Japan, where Warren Clark took ninth place overall, Scott Guyton 11th, Brendan Vesty 13th, Graeme Miller 44th and Bryce Shapley 46th.

Miller won the sprint series, while Vesty was third in the hills, with Glen Mitchell sixth.

Some of Europe's top professional cycling teams took part and New Zealand finished third in the teams classification.

- NZPA