Italy has been one of the standouts of this European Junior and U23 Track Championships and was once again on the fifth and penultimate day of the event with three gold medals. However, they had competition to match, with Great Britain and Germany winning two gold medals each.
The day was once again marked by the omnium races, this time at under-23 level. Lara Gillespie (Ireland), with 126 points, was the strongest in the women’s race, followed by Belgium’s Katrijn de Clercq (118 points) and the Netherlands’ Maike van der Duin (117 points). The young Irishwoman collected just 22 points in the scratch (10th), but dominated the tempo and elimination races, collecting 40 points in both. In the final event, the points race, she gathered another 24 points for a total of 126 points, enough to win the gold medal.
In the men’s competition, gold went to Tim Torn Teutenberg (Germany) once again. The German collected a total of 142 points, 36 in the scratch (3rd), 36 in the tempo race (3rd), 36 in the elimination (3rd) and 34 in the final event, the points race. Tim Wafler (Austria) with 118 points and Elmar Abma (Netherlands) with 113 points completed the podium.
Saturday also featured the first keirin races of the competition, the under-23s. Beatrice Bertolini (Italy) was the strongest in the women’s, ahead of Marie Louisa Drouode (France) and Anna Whitworth Hay (Great Britain), and Pete-Collin Flemming (Germany) stood out in the men’s race, edging out Tjorven Mertens (Belgium) and Etienne Oliviero (France), who rounded out the podium.
In the junior points races, Seana Littbarski-Gray (Germany), with 38 points, was the leader among the women, with France’s Léane Tabu (31 points) and Portugal’s Patrícia Duarte (22 points) taking second and third. In the men’s race, Juan David Sierra (Italy) stood out with an impressive 70 points, a clear difference to second Patryk Goszczurn (Poland), who had 39, and to third Ramazan Yilmaz (Turkey), who had 30.
Finally, mention should be made of the under-23 women’s 500m time trial, where Rhianna Parris-Smith (Great Britain), with a time of 34.129s and an average of 52.741 km/h, overcame Julie Nicolaes (Belgium) and Clara Schneider (Germany), and of the under-23 men’s individual speed race, where Mattia Predomo (Italy) was the fastest, outpacing Tijmen van Loon (Netherlands) and Hayden Norris (Great Britain).
The European Championship, which has been taking place since Tuesday at the Sangalhos National Velodrome in Anadia, comes to an end this Sunday.
