Cycling: World champ Shanks on target to defend pursuit crown

World champion Alison Shanks has broken her 3000m individual pursuit national record at the New Zealand track cycling championships in Invercargill.

Shanks clocked 3m 30.180s in yesterday's heats to slip under the record she set at the track a year ago and grab the fastest qualifying time.

Her time was less than 38/100ths of a second outside the time she set in winning the world championship in Poland and faster than her winning effort in the recent Beijing World Cup.

She was to ride off against Mid-Canterbury's Lauren Ellis who produced a massive personal best of 3min 36.027sec to force her way into the gold medal ride.

"That felt really great, the best I've felt on the track for a while," Shanks said.

National team pursuit squad members Kaytee Boyd (Auckland) and Rushlee Buchanan (Waikato Bay of Plenty) will ride for the bronze medal.

Waikato's Peter Latham topped qualifiers in the men's 4000m individual pursuit and was to meet fellow world championship medallist Wes Gough in tonight's final.

Latham clocked 4min 20.438sec to qualify for his first New Zealand final while Gough (Waipukurau) was a second back to reach his second national individual pursuit final.

Beijing Olympic medallist Marc Ryan (Timaru) and Tasman's Jason Allen will ride-off for bronze.

Earlier all the big guns qualified through to tonight's finals in the keirin with national sprint champion Natasha Hansen and Auckland's Rosy McCall winning the women's heats.

In the men's competition triple junior world champion Sam Walker, fellow junior world team sprint teammate Ethan Mitchell, kilo record setter Eddie Dawkins and Simon Van Velthooven are all through.

- NZPA