Cycling
AN INTERNATIONAL cyclist with family connections in Eskdale was part of the GB women’s team pursuit quartet which won gold at the track cycling world cup in Glasgow last Saturday.
The win came on the opening day of the Tissot UCI championships at the Sir Chris Hoy Velodrome.
Ellie Dickinson, whose family lives in Canonbie, joined Katie Archibald, Elinor Barker and Neah Evans on the team.
They were impressive throughout their three rides, qualifying fastest before catching their Belgian opponents in the first round to book their place in the final.
There, they met Germany, who competed well but were ultimately unable to live with the British, who recorded a time of 4.12.244, their fastest outside of Olympic competition. The Germans were slower by 2.099 seconds.
They took three seconds off their winning time in October in Apeldoorn, the Netherlands.
This time also represented the fastest of this Olympic cycle, with only eight months to go until the Tokyo Games, and the fourth-fastest of all time.
Ellie has been a member of the GB cycling team podium programme since last year. She also won the sports personality of year at the Annandale and Eskdale sports awards in 2018.
After the race, Dickinson said: “It just felt hard. The crowd is so loud and you’re trying to concentrate on what you’re doing and you ask, are we going that fast?”
Archibald added: “That feels very good. We went in with a plan which, I think, scared us all a little bit.
“We were going to front end it and put those long turns in early.
“That’s what you see the best nations in the world do but we’ve stuck to what we’re safe doing because it’s worked and it’s served us well in the past.
“To challenge ourselves like that and to come out with a win feels good.”
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