Cycling: Kiwis come close as World Cup wraps up

Eddie Dawkins came close to securing a bronze. Photo / Greg Bowker

New Zealand could not add to their medal haul on the final day of the cycling World Cup, but Eddie Dawkins pushed within centimetres in the bronze medal sprint decider.

After losing his semi-final 2-0 to Australian Matthew Glaetzer, Dawkins dueled with German Maximilian Levy but finished fourth.

Levy, decked out in loud board short design lycra, powered ahead of Dawkins on the final lap; the New Zealander was left straining to match him as they crossed the line.

"The crowd was going crazy but Max Levy is a world-class bike rider," Dawkins said. "The Germans were all in top form fighting for their own positions and I only lost by a little bit. I can pull that back in Rio."

Sprint team coach Anthony Peden believed more can be expected soon.

"He's not at his best, even though we saw some great sprinting. It's not the Eddie Dawkins we're going to see in Rio. He'll go faster and cleaner."

Dawkins beaten teammate Sam Webster 2-0 in their sprint duel to advance to the semi-finals.

Both employed guile and cunning to position themselves for a final push, but Dawkins' power proved too much.

The pair had delivered New Zealand a convincing start to the final day of competition, progressing into the final eight with narrow victories over Chinese pair Xu Chao (Dawkins) and Bao Saifei (Webster).

After the qualifying round, Dawkins produced a comfortable victory over Ireland's Eoin Mullen. Webster's proposition was more difficult in the form of Robert Forstemann, a member of the German team which beat the New Zealanders in Saturday's team sprint final.

Forstemann is famous in the cycling fraternity for producing a video where he generated enough wattage on an exercycle to cook a piece of toast. On this occasion it was Webster who gave his rival a sprint grilling.

Elsewhere, Nick Kergozou completed the fastest omnium 1km time trial in 1m 02.559s and fastest flying lap in a personal best 12.829s. He finished seventh overall after the points race.

"Being my first international [omnium] event it's been a big step, but this morning made it worthwhile by winning two events. On the opening day I struggled to find the legs but woke up and felt alright today... but that points race was gruelling.

"A few times I was in the danger zone, so had to keep reassuring myself. It's quite an art and a big step up when you're 19 and going against guys who are 30 and have been to Olympics."

In the women's equivalent, Holly Edmondston dropped from 11th to 18th today. She ranked 14th in the time trial, 20th in the flying lap and 19th in the points race.

Natasha Hansen failed to progress to the second round in her keirin heat, won her repechage and finished 12th overall after the ride offs.

On the periphery to the New Zealand success was the theory they gained a training advantage over their opposition as days and hours of training become precious in the eight months to the Games. With the benefit of no jet lag the team was expected to be back into their programme this morning.

"Normally we'd be up at 4am the following day packing the team up ready to come home and recover," high performance director Mark Elliott said.

- Andrew Alderson in Cambridge