Essay On Track Cycling

One of the Games' most entertaining sports, (and the only thing the Brits are good at aside from inventing sports and then being crap at them) track cycling is not a very popular sport in this part of the world. A combination of lack of general awareness of the sport and sparse Indian competition, the sport has not caught on well in our land.

The Olympics host a total of 10 track events, 3 individual and 2 team events each for men and women. The team events for both men and women are the team sprint and the team pursuit, while the individual events are the sprint, the keirin, and the omnium. The cyclists cycle around a 250 m wooden track on high tech bikes clad in spandex going at over 40-50 kmph.

The Bike

The bike is fully carbon fibre and is designed to be highly aerodynamic. It can reach speeds of up to 60 kmph. This high speed means that races come down to split second differences sometimes in hundredths or even thousandths of a second. To shave off every thousandth second, the bikes have no brakes as they are too heavy, unnecessary during a race and

It is the most gruelling track cycling event held across just two days. It has a scratch race (15km classic everyone starts together winner is the first to cross the finish), a 1 km time trial for men and a 500 m for women (2 riders at a time starting opposite ends of the track), a flying lap (individual time trial over 250 m with a flying start for both men and women), a points race (long race 30 km for men and 20 km for women with sprints held every 10 laps and leaders getting up to 4 extra points and 20 extra points for lapping the pack over the 120 laps for men and 80 for women), an elimination race (last rider every 2 laps is eliminated) and an individual pursuit (same as team just one-one-one 3km for women and 4 km for men). Points are awarded to finishers of each event and the overall winner is the one with highest