Top of the Worlds

not.

It shows how far British cycling has come over the last few years that coming away from the 2013 UCI Road World Championships with one medal was a great disappointment.

One silver in the men’s elite time trial. Though there was a gold in the women’s team time trial and two bronzes in the men’s TT but as they were trade team events it almost feels as if they don’t really count. And when it’s racked up in the medal table Katie Colclough’s gold goes to her team country the USA.

Sunday’s 272.26 kilometre slog around Florence provided the biggest disappointment as the GB starts disappeared from the race far earlier than you would have expected. After Cav had powered them into the city, followed by Luke Rowe doing sterling work they dropped out until with just 80km still to go there was no GB riders left of the eight that started.

Yes Wiggins and Cav were caught up in crashes and there was quite a number of them. And the weather was foul, while the GB riders were riding, but then that was the same for everyone out there. And hell shouldn’t riders representing GB be used to riding in the wet?

They just didn’t seem to be able to handle it. Not for the first time for Wiggins. He’s got a major problem descending in the wet by the looks of things.

At least those at the top are saying the right things, not the usual banal excuses and platitudes you get from the likes of the football, rugby and cricket. No we’ll be taking the positives.

They are all disappointed and they need to be.
A lot of people were talking the talk and didn’t see it through. No excuses, each and every one of them underperformed today. They will look at themselves in the mirror tonight and think they didn’t do a very good job

The lads are all disappointed in themselves and they are right to be disappointed. To have nobody in the race with 100km to go is not normal for us. I don’t think they showed what they’re worth. You have to be prepared for anything and I don’t think the lads were.

The lads have got to look at themselves. They’re all full-time bike riders and if we’re talking about going forward, talking about Rio 2016, this was a very disappointing result.
They all got a bit too carried away too early, then the weather got to them for no reason. There are no excuses at all.Rod Ellingworth

Wasn’t it funny that just after Brian Cookson was elected the new head of the UCI that information was released that British Sky rider Jonathan Tiernan-Locke has been notified of a potential discrepancy in his biological passport data?