Canadian track cyclists win Olympic bronze in team pursuit

Canadian track cyclists Allison Beveridge, Kirsti Lay, Jasmin Glaesser and Georgia Simmerling defeated New Zealand to win a bronze medal Saturday afternoon in women's team pursuit.

• SCHEDULE AND RESULTS: Women's team pursuit 
• VIDEO: Canada wins bronze in women's team pursuit
• Americans change bikes, Canada adds skier
• Georgia Simmerling's quest for Olympic medal takes her on historic road

Canada covered the four-kilometre race in four minutes 14.627 seconds, nearly four seconds faster than its opponent (4:18.459) at the Rio Olympic Velodrome.

In the morning's final heat race, Canada needed to beat Australia's time of 4:20.262 to keep its medal chances alive and came through, stopping the clock in 4:15.636.

Great Britain won gold, setting its second world record of the day and third in two days in 4:10.236. The United States won silver.

The Brits advanced first from Thursday's qualifier, setting a new world time in 4:13.260. The Americans took over as the record holders when they stopped the clock in 4:12.282 in their Saturday heat.

But a few minutes later, Great Britain regained the title with a 4:12.152 performance.

Australia (4:21.232), Italy (4:28.368) and China rounded out the top seven. China's time didn't matter as it was an automatic seventh-place finisher when Poland was disqualified earlier in the day for an infraction.

Lay, who won silver at the worlds in March with Simmerling, Glaesser and Beveridge — was inserted back into the Canadian group in place of Vancouver's Laura Brown, who had competed with the team earlier this week.

Simmerling is the first Canadian athlete to compete in three different sports at three separate Olympics. The West Vancouver, B.C., native raced for Canada in alpine skiing at the Vancouver Games six years ago before taking up ski cross ahead of Sochi in 2014. She believes those experiences have prepared her for a stage that is both different and the same.

"I'm used to the media, the crowd," said Simmerling on Thursday. "That has really helped me come into this sport and excel. I draw off the crowd as I do from my other sports. That mental experience with high-pressure situations has been huge."

Simmerling and her teammates came to Brazil with high hopes after Canada grabbed bronze in London four years ago and a podium spot at the last four world championships. While athletes have been moved in and out of the lineup like chess pieces since then — Glaesser is the only remaining competitor from 2012 to suit up in Rio — the results have stayed fairly consistent.

Women's keirin

Kate O'Brien and Monique Sullivan, both of Calgary, were eliminated in the repechage on Saturday morning.

O'Brien finished second in her heat to Russia's Anastasiia Voinova, a gold medallist in the 500-metre time trial at last year's UCI track cycling worlds, while Sullivan was last in her heat.

O'Brien, who transitioned from bobsleigh to track cycling two years ago, was in front when the electric track bike left the course. Soon, Voinova made an explosive jump to nudge in front of the less experienced Canadian, and O'Brien didn't have the speed to overtake her, finishing 0.175 seconds behind.

The 28-year-old has risen up the international ranks in her brief time on the track cycling circuit. Earlier this year, O'Brien finished sixth in the sprint, ninth in team sprint and 17th in keirin at the UCI worlds.

Last summer, she won gold in team sprint with Sullivan and silver in sprint at the Pan Am Games in Toronto. In 2014, O'Brien narrowly missed qualifying for the Sochi Olympics as a bobsleigh brakeman.

Sullivan, 27, couldn't recover in her heat race after she was boxed in, with Lyubov Shulika of the Ukraine racing by her while one of the two Spanish riders came over the top, and the Canadian faded down the stretch.

With files from The Canadian Press