Tour de France runner-up Cadel Evans of Australia has withdrawn from Thursday’s Olympic Games road time trial because of a knee injury. Evans told reporters in Sydney that he will undergo treatment this week before deciding whether to compete in the Olympic road race.

His spot in the time trial will be filled by three-time world champion Michael Rogers.

The Associated Press reports that Evans injured the knee last Sunday, and that it swelled during an airplane flight to Switzerland on Monday. He has seen a doctor for treatment. “I recognized I might not be at my absolute best in the race against the clock, but I can still make a significant contribution to the team effort for the road race” he said.

from: latimesblogs.latimes.com

Australian cyclist Anna Meares, winner of the 2004 Olympic 500-meter gold medal in track cycling, could miss a chance to defend her title due to a serious race accident.
Meares suffered a fractured neck vertebrae and dislocated shoulder in a crash during a track cycling World Cup meet in Los Angeles nine days ago.
The crash has put her Beijing Olympic selection in jeopardy and forced her out of Australian and world championship meets.
“I realize that I’m pretty lucky with the injuries that I have come away with,” Meares said Tuesday. “The C2 vertebrae, so I have been told, is the one that controls all your breathing and if that goes, so too does your life.”
Meares, who will be sidelined for about six weeks, sits fourth on the World Cup points table, with the top nine granted an Olympic berth.
With two Olympic qualification meetings to come, Meares, 24, could be surpassed by other riders _ meaning she would need an exemption from world cycling’s governing body, the UCI.
The UCI can award wild cards to riders, but only if a pre-qualified cyclist withdraws from the Olympics.
“If I miss out on points, I will have to continue training through and hope the UCI gives me that wild card,” she said.
Australian track cycling head coach Martin Barras said Meares’ Olympic selection “has been taken out of our hands”.
“Where we had control of the selection process, now we don’t anymore,” Barras said.
“Considering the severity of the injuries, we don’t want to mingle with her recovery with any sort of pressure with regards to qualifying or getting back into racing before she is fully ready _ the severity of the neck injury dictates that.”
Meares also suffered torn neck muscles, torn shoulder tendons and bruising in her fall in the kierin final in Los Angeles.
“I remember hitting my head and being in a lot of pain straight away, and the next thing that I remember was being on the bottom of the track being tended to,” she said.
“When it’s explained to you how severe the injury could have been, (I feel) fortunate to walk away with as little as I have got.”

from: chinadaily.com.cn

For the next seven months, American BMX racer Mike Day can train on the Olympic track whenever he wants. All without leaving Southern California.
“It’s surreal,” Day said. “But it’s perfect.” A perfect replica, that is.
USA Cycling and the United States Olympic Committee teamed to build an exact duplicate of the steep, demanding, bumpy-and-jumpy BMX course that’ll be used at the Beijing Games in August. Training at the venue began this week, with the formal ribbon-cutting ceremony set to take place on Monday.
It’s on the grounds of the Olympic Training Center a few miles (kilometers) south of San Diego, not far from the Mexican border.
But to Day and the rest of the American Olympic hopefuls, it’s like training in Beijing’s backyard.
“To us, it’s the greatest thing ever,” Day said. “This is the ideal place for a pro BMX racer, for sure. I think they see a lot of potential and a lot of hope for Beijing. Now it’s on our shoulders to do it. The guys who qualify, we’re already pretty talented, and now we’ll be prepared to the fullest.”
The Americans have no doubt that every nuance of this track, from the steep, 40-foot (12-meter) descent at the start ramp to the type of banked blacktop in the turns, is exactly the same as what was done in Beijing. That’s because the same builder did them both.
When a major cycling organization wants a BMX track built, they call Tom Ritzenthaler, who’s raced for the past 33 years and now is the premier track designer in the world. He built the one in Beijing, and leaves next week for Greece to build that country’s first course.
But only the United States has the replica of the Beijing course.
“It’s almost unfair,” said longtime standout racer Jill Kintner, 26. “It’s a big edge.”
Not that she minds, of course.
It’s not some shady back-room deal that brought this track to Chula Vista; no other nation contacted Ritzenthaler in time to build a training site, although others, including Australia, did inquire about his availability. USA Cycling officials, in a goodwill gesture, are expected to invite other nations to the training center for a brief camp later this year.
“It takes a lot of time and a lot of experience to do this,” said Ritzenthaler, who built the Beijing track for about 3.2 million U.S. dollars (2.2 million euro) but constructed the U.S. replica for considerably less, although no one knows what the final total is exactly.
Much like when snowboarding made its debut on sport’s biggest stage, the U.S. is expected to use BMX as a way of quickly enhancing the medal count.
“That’s kind of the idea, to build a facility at the highest level, and I think the USOC recognized our strength as a country in this sport since we created it back in the 1970s,” said Mike King, the BMX program director for USA Cycling. “This has definitely raised the bar, and I think we’ll see the results come August.”

from: xinhuanet.com 

Theo Bos of Netherlands finished first in the men’s sprint event to contribute another gold to the country, as the Round No. 2 of the UCI Track Cycling World Cup Classics closed here Sunday night.

On the medal rankings, the Neds ranked first with four gold medals and two bronzes. France, Great Britain and Team DSB each grabbed two golds, while China placed in the 20th position with two bronzes.

The race for gold

Theo Bos

There are 376 riders from 44 countries and regions competed in The UCI 2007-2008 Track Cycling World Cup Classics from December 7 to 9. Ten Olympic track cycling events are contested at the three-day competition, including the men’s sprint, team sprint, individual pursuit, team pursuit, Keirin, points race, Madison, and the women’s sprint, individual pursuit and points race. The winners automatically qualify for the next year’s Olympic Games, according to the qualification system.
The third leg of the world cup will be held in Log Angeles from January 18 to 20 and the fourth in Ballerup, Demark from February 15 to 17, 2008.

The race for gold

from: beijing2008.cn (more details and more pictures)

(BEIJING, December 8 ) — Three Olympic qualifying events — the women’s points race, and the men’s team pursuit and Keirin — and four non-Olympic events — women’s 500-meter time trial, team sprint, and the men’s kilometer time trial and scratch race — were contested on the second day of the No. 2 of the UCI Track Cycling World Cup Classics in Beijing.
At the nearly built Laoshan Velodrome in western Beijing, the Great Britain won the Olympic berths for men’s team pursuit and keirin events, while the Dutch took the other Olympic qualifying event.

The men’s Keirin event

In the men’s team pursuit, Edward Clancy, Stephen Cummings, Thomas Geraint and Paul Manning of Great Britain beat the New Zealanders in the final to qualify for the 2008 Olympic qualification. In the race for the third place, the Danes did not finish the laps, thus rendering the bronze to their counterparts the Neds.
Reigning world champion Chris Hoy of Great Britain won another Olympic spot for his country as he snatched the gold medal of the men’s Keirin event. The silver medal went to Arnaud Tournant of France and bronze to Teun Mulder of the Netherlands.
In the women’s 20km points race, Dutch cyclist Marianne Vos of Team DSB, who clinched her first gold from the women’s scratch event on Friday, was crowned again with a total score of 12 points. Even though Cuba’s Yoanka Gonzalez Perez shared the same score, Vos had a preferable finish order that gave her, in accordance with the competition rules, the first position in the final placing. The reigning world champion Katherine Bates came in the third place while China’s medal contender Yan Li scored zero points to rank in the 20th position.
In the women’s 500-meter time trial, title favorite Guerra Rodriguez of Cuba powered to a victory in 33.994 seconds, just 0.05 seconds away from the world record of 33.944 seconds. Guerra was also the silver medalist at the Sydney leg of the World Cup one week ago, following world record holder Anna Meares of Austrialia. Simona Krupeckaite from Lithuania placed second in the time trial at 34.447 seconds, while Natallia Tsylinskaya from Belarus took third place at 34.595 seconds.

The women’s team sprint

In the women’s team sprint, Dutch duo Yvonne Hijgenaar-Willy Kanis extended the winning streak on the standings of the world cup, as they edged the French pair of Sandie Clair and Virginie Cueff to snatch a victory of the second leg here with a time of 33.726 seconds. The Neds did grab the gold medal in the event at the world cup opener in Sydney nearly one week ago.
In the men’s kilometer individual time trial, Francois Pervis of France won the title with a time of 1:02.029, followed by Yevgen Bolibrukh of Ukraine in second place and Li Weibao in third.
The gold medal in the men’s scratch went to Michael Friedman of the United States, with Walter Fernando Perez of Argentina second and Tim Mertens of Belgium third. Reigning world champion Kam-Po Wang came in the 18th position.
Ten Olympic track cycling events are contested at the three-day Beijing leg of the World Cup from December 7 to 9, 2007. They are the men’s sprint, team sprint, individual pursuit, team pursuit, Keirin, points race, Madison, and the women’s sprint, individual pursuit and points race. The winners will automatically qualify for the next year’s Olympic Games, according to the qualification system.

from: beijing2008.cn