Performance director hesitant to predict GB Olympics medal haul

With 100 days until the Tokyo Olympics, British Cycling performance director Stephen Park says it would be a “stab in the dark” to predict whether the medal rush of recent years can be repeated.

As Covid continues to bring chaos to the global calendar and the Dr Richard Freeman case raises questions at home, the year has thrown up challenges like no other.

“We’ve got people who we see being able to win medals who might not even get to the Games because of the impact on the qualification process,” Park said.

“We have to be pragmatic about it. We can only control the factors within our control.”

There are no qualification issues in the velodrome, but a lack of race opportunities has left the team guessing as to whether they have made up deficits seen at the World Championships in Berlin 13 months ago.

With this month’s Newport round of the Nations Cup cancelled, doubts over the Colombian leg in June and a reluctance to travel en masse to Hong Kong in May, Laura and Jason Kenny are in a powerful British squad heading to a meeting in Ghent this weekend which has morphed into a miniEuropean championships.

But Park said other countries have now caught up with Britain in the velodrome and the nation’s best chance to top the cycling medal table at a fourth consecutive Games, may rest with BMX, road, and mountain biking.

Covid-19 has had huge impact on the qualification process, with the mountain bike and BMX calendar ripped up.

In mountain biking, Britain has so far qualified only one place for a female rider, perhaps leaving emerging star Tom Pidcock in the cold despite his potential to medal.

Britain have qualified one male and female rider in BMX and could yet double up in each, with Park hoping enough opportunities arise for the 21-year-old Beth Shriever to get the points she needs to attend her first Games, though time is short.

Last month’s verdict from a medical tribunal that former British Cycling and Team Sky doctor Richard Freeman ordered testosterone “knowing or believing” it was intended to dope a rider also casts a shadow.

Park said: “It annoys the hell out of me that these stories come up and reflect poorly on British Cycling, our current staff and our current riders.

“All that does is impact today’s athletes, it does nothing to punish anybody who did or didn’t do anything in the past.

“I think it would be naive to think it doesn’t have some form of impact and become some form of distraction but we’ve got a lot of riders who are very strong, very resilient and robust and they just focus on what’s next.”

Against this backdrop, the measure of success in Tokyo may look different. Park said his goal was to create an environment in which riders can perform at their best, but UK Sport will want tangible results.

“We are expecting to be medal competitive in the vast majority of our events,” he said. “I realise that’s not a specific answer, but I think you’d be taking a stab in the dark at the moment to say much more.”

Britain dominated cycling events in recent Olympics.