Olympic champion Elinor Barker was left disappointed despite picking up a silver medal on the opening day of the Track Cycling World Championships in Hong Kong.
The 22-year-old narrowly missed out on a rainbow jersey having been part of a group to lap the field with just three remaining, but lost out to Italy’s Rachele Barbieri in the final sprint.
Day one in Hong Kong also saw the men’s team pursuit team qualify for the bronze medal race on Thursday, while the women qualified fifth fastest in their event.
And despite two World Cup gold medals earlier in the season, the team sprint trio of Jack Carlin, Joe Truman and Rio reserve Ryan Owens just missed out on a ride for a medal.
But it was Barker who stole the show for the Brits as she takes a break from team pursuit duty, just missing out on her first individual rainbow jersey.
“I went ever so slightly too soon and that cost me the race I suppose,” said the two-time team pursuit world champion.
“I guess just not fast enough or maybe pushed too much air too early on in the sprint.
“I’m a bit disappointed now but hopefully by tomorrow I’ll feel a bit better and a bit more proud of it. I don’t think I’m going to enjoy watching that race again.
“You need to watch out for different people all the time. Congratulations to her but I am really disappointed.”
In the pursuit a quartet of Chris Latham, Andy Tennant, Mark Stewart and Ollie Wood booked their place in the bronze-medal ride against Italy after beating Switzerland in the first round.
The foursome qualified fifth fastest for the first round proper with a time of 3:58.936, meaning the best they could hope for was the bronze medal race.
And they made it with a time of 3:56.796 against Switzerland, with Australia and New Zealand left to fight it out for gold.
In the women’s event a new combination of Emily Kay, Emily Nelson, Manon Lloyd and Ellie Dickinson also qualified fifth fastest with a personal best time of 4:21.548.
With Katie Archibald and Barker both focussing on individual events post-Rio, Joanna Rowsell Shand having retired and Laura Kenny currently pregnant, Lloyd, Kay and Dickinson were all making World Championship debuts.
They race again in their first round proper on Thursday, with, like the men, a spot in the bronze medal race the best they now achieve.
And it was frustration in the men’s team sprint as Carlin, Owens and Truman narrowly missed out on a medal ride.
Despite setting an earlier time of 43.416s to qualify third fastest, in round one they lost out to the Netherlands by less than two-hundredths of a second.
The trio, all debutants at a senior track World Championship, were disheartened by the result but already looking forward and learning from the experience.
“We’ve got a good group of guys, fantastic support team,” said Truman. “We came with the form of our lives and haven’t really been able to execute really. We win as a team, we lose as a team, we’ll move on from this.”
With Carlin adding: "I think as a team we’ve come here with not much expectation. We’re obviously all disappointed.
“There were better teams than us today. There were positives and negatives, but a lot of positives to take away today."
Thursday’s action begins at 8am (BST) with qualifying for the women’s sprint and first rounds of the men’s kierin.
With the 12pm (BST) medal session seeing the team pursuits and men’s keirin reach their conclusion, as well as the men’s scratch race and women’s sprint quarter-finals. Sportsbeat 2017