Clancy lauds Wood's talent after team pursuit triumph

Eleven years may separate them in age but Wood and Clancy teamed up alongside Kian Emadi and Steven Burke to win TISSOT UCI World Cup gold in Manchester this weekend.

On the track they call home, the quartet simply blew their Danish opponents away to win team pursuit gold in a time of 3:55.847 - Great Britain's first victory of the weekend.

Almost lapping their European counterparts, it was a far cry from their tussle with France in the first round where the Brits stole the win on the line.

But they got the job done in the one that mattered to seal 21-year-old Wood's second World Cup title - having topped the podium in the same event in Glasgow, a year ago.

For Huddersfield's Clancy, it was Wood's performance that impressed him the most on the Manchester boards, and with three years to go until the next Olympics roll around, the pressure is on to keep his place in the team.

"You never know when your time is going to come, and looking there at Ollie Wood at the back, I'd say out the four of us he was the strongest," said Clancy.

"One hundred per cent I'd love to go to Tokyo and that is 100 per cent the aim.

"I might have already had my day, but I'm going to give it a good go."

The opportunity to race at world-level on home boards is rarely more than an annual occurrence for British riders but it was one Wood was sure to take advantage of.

And with the Track World Championships in Apeldoorn, the Netherlands, only a matter of months away, Wood insists his team are headed in the right direction.

"That was great. It's the fastest I've ever gone but I think a lot of that was to do with the home support," said Wood.

"It's quite flattering for Ed to say that about me. You're only as fast as your weakest man, so we need to be as strong as each other ideally.

"For everyone to do what we did there, I think we all need to give ourselves a pat on the back."

Sportsbeat 2017