Rio 2016: Team GB men win sprint gold as records tumble

The Team GB men's team sprint trio of Philip Hindes, Jason Kenny and Callum Skinner have won gold in Rio, beating New Zealand in the final this evening.

It's the third Olympics in a row that Great Britain have taken the gold medal in the event, and Kenny's fourth gold of his career, with two more medal opportunities to come in the keirin and the individual sprint, where he is reigning Olympic champion.

He said: “It was all a bit of a surprise really. We’ve been going quite well in training so we had a rough idea of what we could do but we surpassed that in that first ride when we set that Olympic record. At that point I thought we could run away with it like London but then New Zealand came back at us and set the benchmark. We just went into the final with nothing to lose.

  “The team event is always the best no doubt about it. You get to win it with your mates and I remember that with Chris and Jamie in Beijing and then again in London. It’s good to share it with your mates – it can get a bit lonely winning on your own.

  “We made it a priority to make sure Callum was on the back of us so we could protect him as much as possible. We knew he had it in him so I’m not surprised that he’s stepped up to be the best in the world. It all came together and we’re really chuffed. Today was pretty special and it was a good first day in the velodrome for all of us.”

Both the men's and women's team pursuit teams qualified fastest to set up a chance of qualifying for the final - the men tomorrow, the women, who set a new world record, on Saturday.

In the men's team pursuit, Team GB will race New Zealand later today with the winner progressing to the gold medal race this evening.

  Coach Iain Dyer said: “We just need to execute now. We feel good, we feel confident and we are on schedule. The plan was to do what is done, execute the first race which we did really, really well so nothing changes.

"We need to come back and do it twice again, in the semi-final and then hopefully the final. The semi-final we could gauge and leave a little bit in the tank for the final hopefully, but we will wait and see what happens.”