CYCLING -31/10/2009
Gold for Hoy, Pendleton
Just a week after claiming three titles at the national championships, four-times Olympic champion Hoy (pictured) comfortably held off Greece's Christos Volikakis and Germany's Maximillan Levy.
Hoy needed to use all his cunning tactics to progress through a tough semi-final but produced a front-runners' performance when it mattered.
But with three more events in the next two days, Hoy said he is not getting carried away.
"I think it was a bit more predictable and a bit more controlled than the semi-final; the semi-final was a bit of a hairy one," he said.
"I had to come in front of that from the outside but it gave me the confidence that I had the gas in the tank that, if I got in that position, I could get out of it.
"In the final, I didn't want to take any risks, so I took it from the front, as I like to.
"It was pretty hard, trying to string them out. I was looking over my shoulder and under my arm, and as soon as they started keeping up I'd give it a little bit more.
"It shows how unpredictable a keirin can be. I think sometimes people presume it's a formality but it's anything but."
Hoy certainly looks in good shape at his first major international event since injuring his hip during the World Cup in Copenhagen eight months ago.
And he credits last week's national championships as giving him a timely boost ahead.
"The standard of last week's national keirin was exceptionally high, so that gave me real confidence coming in here," he added.
"My team-mates are right up there with the best riders in the world, so when you beat those guys you know you can beat anybody else.
"I've got three more events to go - the sprint, team sprint, and JKA keirin. This is the biggest workload I'll ever do over three days but it's very important to do well here."
Victoria Pendleton won Britain’s fourth gold – following earlier successes by Geraint Thomas and Chris Newton – beating one-time training partner Shuang Guo in the women’s sprint final.
However, the Chinese sprinter, a bronze medallist in Beijing, made the Olympic champion work for her victory.
Pendleton won the first race but Guo forced a decider, which the world champion won with a trademark burst - although she was far from happy.
“My tactics were shocking,” said Pendleton. “I didn’t do my mum a lot of favours. She struggles watching me race as it is, so I feel quite bad to be honest with you.
“I haven’t really raced since the Worlds and I performed like a bit of a wally, it was a shock to the system.
"Physically, I’ve got good legs – the time trials showed that – but I just made it very hard to myself. I got my money’s worth of racing, that’s for sure.
“However, I’ve learned a lot and it’s been a bit of a wake-up call.
"I’m definitely very annoyed with myself at my lack of technical expertise, I’m supposedly wearing a world champion’s jersey. It’s definitely given me some motivation to work on that before the Worlds.”
Elsewhere, Germany’s Stefan Nimke won the men’s kilometre time trial in 1.01.293 while Great Britain’s David Daniell took silver, four tenths behind.
Watch highlights of the UCI Track Cycling World Cup from Manchester at 5.30pm on Sunday on British Eurosport 2 (Sky 411 / Virgin Media 525); Also available on your PC via the Eurosport Player - click on the link under the picture to subscribe