Mark Cavendish is set to make his return to the Track Cycling World Championships after being named in Great Britain’s 21-strong team for next month’s competition in London.
The 30-year-old last competed at the event in 2009, a year after winning his second Madison world title, but has since switched to concentrating on the road.
However in the run up to this summer’s Olympic Games in Rio, he has made no secret of his aim to compete on the track once again.
He will partner Sir Bradley Wiggins in the Madison once again – Wiggins having won gold with Cavendish at the last home Worlds in 2008 – with the Championships taking place at Lee Valley VeloPark from March 2-6.
A number of the team will be returning to the site of their 2012 Olympic Games successes with Laura Trott, Joanna Rowsell Shand, Ed Clancy, Steven Burke, Jason Kenny and Phil Hindes all named in the squad.
Great Britain will be aiming to improve on their showing at last year’s Track Cycling World Championships, which saw them only come away with three silvers.
And with Rio 2016 fast approaching, British Cycling technical director Shane Sutton was viewing the competition as a vital stepping stone.
“We’ve selected the strongest squad available to us for these worlds - we’re in good shape and the team we’ve selected is close to the Olympic model,” he told British Cycling.
“It’s great to see Ed Clancy and Katie Archibald included on the squad and that’s testament to the hard work of the Performance Support Team who have ably led the rehabilitation of these riders following their respective injuries.
“Winning is always a key objective for any sports team and we’re sticking to our long-term goal which is success at the Olympic Games in Rio so we’ll be making performance decisions based on this strategy.
“That said, there’s been a marked increase in momentum within the squad recently and we’ve been seeing some promising numbers in training, so I’m expecting to see some strong performances across the board and spectators will be guaranteed to see some world-class competition.”
Sportsbeat 2016