World Track Championships 2010: Pendleton surpasses Burton but Hoy crashes out

Victoria Pendleton showed imperious form in the sprint to take the final 2-0 against Chinese rider Shuang Guo. Pendleton came through to win despite a nasty-looking crash in the second race, when she seemed to lose her wheel on the steep corner banking and crashed to the middle of the track, hurting her elbows in the process. The win makes her the most successful British female track cyclist of all time, overtaking the legendary Beryl Burton.

Pendleton blamed the crash on the fact that the banking at the Ballerup Superarena is steeper than Manchester where Team GB train.

After a fairly routine win in the first race she was pushed to the front in the second by Guo, but had plenty of pace to see off the challenge of the Chinese rider, denying her the chance to take it to a best of three. Pendleton clinched her fourth sprint title having not lost a single race in the process, and her path to the final included a demolition of Australian Anna Meares in the semis.

"People have such high expectations of British cyclists that only gold feels good enough. It's hard for us but I will enjoy this moment when I look back on it at the end of these championships."

"The crash didn't faze me. In fact, when you crash you get a bit of an adrenaline rush, and it can help you get up and get stuck in.". Pendleton confirmed that the injuries won't stop her competing in the Keirin racing tomorrow.

Lizzie Armitstead was also competing in the Omnium and battled hard to a well-earned second position behind Tara Whitten (CAN). She was sixth in the 200m time trial and second in the 5km scratch race. Her time of 2:26.451 in the 2km pursuit was good enough for ninth spot, and third place in the 10km points race gave her a sher of the lead with Whitten. In the final 500m time trial she went head to head with Whitten but lost out, her ninth fastest not enough to take the gold ahead of Whitten, who came in third.

The omnium medal is a good portent for 2012 where it becomes an Olympic discipline, albeit in a rather different format, spread over the course of the track programme and with an added sixth discipline.

Pendleton's win and Armitstead's silver put a better spin on a hard day for Team GB as the male sprint team suffered an mass exit in the quarter finals. Chris Hoy was up against defending champion Gregory Bauge of France, and narrowly lost out in a very even best of three, the final race going to a photo finish. Jason Kenny and Matt Crampton also lost out at the same stage.