Bold old time triallists take Olympic gold

Sorry about the lack of reportage on the women’s Olympic road race. I was barbecueing and then couldn’t bluff my way through an article for the simple reason that I know nothing about the winner.

Anna van der Breggen is Dutch and she won La Fleche Wallonne earlier in the year, which is part of the Women’s WorldTour (no space). Sweden’s Emma Johannsson came second. Italy’s Elisa Borghini came third.

Women’s time trial

Today the USA’s Kristin Armstrong won her third Olympic gold medal in this event, a day before her 43rd birthday. She is no relation to that Lance character, even though she has exactly the same name and nationality as his ex-wife.

Russia’s Olga Zabelinskaya, bronze medallist in both the road race and the time trial four years ago, came second. Having served a doping ban, she was only cleared to ride last week after a ruling from the Court of Arbitration of Sport. How spectacularly Russian of her.

Anna van der Breggen came third. You know her. She’s already appeared on this page.

Men’s time trial

You wouldn’t normally consider a four-time world champion and former Olympic champion an unlikely winner, but Switzerland’s Fabian Cancellara will dismount his bike at the end of this season, never to remount competitively. I mean remount with a view to cycling competitively, you understand. There is, as it stands, no Olympic medal on offer for simply clambering onto a bicycle.

To put in clearer terms, Cancellara will be retiring at the end of the year and he seemed to have been working only part-time as a time triallist in recent times anyway.

Not an issue, apparently.

Dutchman Tom Dumoulin came second. Chris Froome came third, just as he did four years ago.

What’s next?

Olympic track cycling runs Thursday through to Sunday. Who knows what kind of report you’ll get out of me. Probably depends how giddy or drunk I get.


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