Matthew Richardson dramatically edged Harrie Lavreysen over the line to win the men’s sprint competition on the final night of the 2022 UCI Track Champions League in London which saw four different classification winners.
Just a day after reaching the top of the standings for the first time in the five-run event, Australian Richardson seemed to have missed his chance to seal the overall victory when Dutchman Lavreysen edged him in the sprint race. .
It meant world champion Lavreysen had a slim one-point lead going into Keirin’s final race, and he was well placed to secure the overall title until the final meters when Richardson appeared just off the line to snatch the victory by two points. .
“I knew it was going to be tight between Harrie and me at the end, but it couldn’t have been closer than that,” Richardson said afterwards.
It was equally nervous in the final of the men’s endurance competition, with Switzerland’s Claudio Imhof and Spain’s Sebastián Mora tied at the top of the standings on the same number of points.
Neither proved victorious in the scratch race won by Britain’s Mark Stewart – his second victory of the campaign – but Imhof took the overall title after finishing two places ahead of Mora in the race to elimination, won by Ollie Wood of Great Britain. It had looked like Imhof would take the win, only for Wood to overtake the Swiss on the final half-lap and win by a bike length.
“It’s just crazy,” smiles Imhof. “I never believed I could win this when I traveled to Mallorca for the first round.”
The women’s sprint and endurance competitions saw less series-defining drama, with Jennifer Valente of the United States set to defend her lead in the endurance standings against British star Katie Archibald.
Just 24 hours before, the Scot had been left disappointed after her gap to Valente widened from one point to eight, with the Scot finishing seventh in the elimination race won by her rival.
This meant that Archibald needed a big mistake from the American in the race for scratch or elimination, a mistake she did not make; In the end, Archibald lost by three points despite a comfortable victory in the elimination race. Chloe Moran of Australia won the scratch event.
“It definitely caps off a much better year than I could have hoped for,” Valente said.
The women’s sprint crown was won predictably by the dominant Mathilde Gros, the world and Olympic champion who won the sprint race to secure her overall title. The Keirin race was won by Colombian Martha Bayona.
Winning the series by 13 points, France’s Gross said: “It was tougher than last year but I had a lot of fun racing with the other riders in the UCI Track Champions League. I’m really happy with my performance and the end result.”
Each of the four leaderboard winners earned €25,000 for their victory.