The commissaires made a mess of keeping track of the men's madison. Belgium were originally declared champions when the race finished and had their world feed winner interview before the commissaires called them up, spent ages looking at the data and then finally removed them from the podium for losing a lap during the race. For the record, GB finished joint-last with Australia, the latter of whom actually gained a lap within the first 10 laps; they both finished 4 laps in arrears of winners Spain. Oh, and Doull crashed twice during these championships.

GB's tally of 5 World Championship medals (fourth in the medal table) is the worst haul since 2004. Germany top the table (which I expected), France are second (which was a bit of a surprise, even considering Pervis's form) and Australia are third.

Without doubt, Francois Pervis and Kristina Vogel are the star performers, since they are the two latest track riders to wear three rainbow jerseys on the same podium. And unless I'm mistaken, Anna Meares now has 22 World Championship medals to her name.

Not sure about that, I had James in the same category as Pendleton, a bit more to her game than just muscle.

I think James is best when she adopts similar tactics to Pendleton, go hard early and capitalise on slightly better endurance than Mears and the other power houses (inc Varnish) who are very good at quick bursts but maybe not for much more than a lap.

Unfortunately that endurance requires being on top form as they can't rely on pure muscle mass.

Vogel is looking a league apart at the moment, though last year James had the better of her, so hopefully James can peak at the right time next year and for the Olympics to put a stronger challenge in.

Indeed. The following track disciplines will be held in Glasgow:

-----

Men
Sprint
Keirin
Team sprint
Kilo
Individual pursuit (4km)
Team pursuit (4km)
Scratch race (20km)
Points race (40km)

Women
Sprint
Semi-kilo
Individual pursuit (3km)
Scratch race (10km)
Points race (25km)

Para-cycling
Sprint B tandem
Kilo time trial B tandem

-----

Compared to the TWC, the men's programme lacks only the omnium and the madison. The women's programme* lacks the team sprint (which was available in 2010), keirin and team pursuit, which I find odd since the Olympic track cycling programme now has 5 disciplines for each gender. Perhaps it's because of the para-cycling disciplines (which are a new addition; 2 for each gender so 4 in total).

Looking further ahead, the 2015 TWC currently lacks a host, and not for lack of trying by the UCI either. London will host it in 2016 since British Cycling only bid for Olympic-year editions (Manchester had it in 1996, 2000 & 2008). Performance-wise, they'll want to be much closer to 2008 than 2000.

[* There has never been a championship women's madison AFAIK]

There's probably not enough teams to make a women's team pursuit worth putting on. England, Canada and Australia were the only Commonwealth countries to enter the Worlds.

Just watching the afternoon racing on RUK and the commentators were chatting between races and one of them mentioned that he's currently reading 'The Death of Marco Pantani'.......and went on to mention that channel 4 will be showing a documentary on the life and death of Pantani in the next month or so.......

That seems unlikely to me because:

* There were only 3 CW squads in the men's team pursuit as well (GB/Australia/New Zealand).
* In the 2013 Juniors Track World Championships, which were held in Glasgow, the GB male quartet finished in fourth place; the GB female quartet (3 of whom are Welsh) got the rainbow jerseys.
* Considering the 2014 TWC overall, the only CW squads with depth are GB, Australia, Canada (women) and NZ (men).

In my view, there is not much of a competitive difference between men and women among CW squads. The Commonwealth Games, whilst not a global championship in a true sense, offers opportunities to athletes who may otherwise be excluded.

Good read if you want the lowdown on Pantani's life. A decade on, it may be too detailed for those who do not remember seeing him ride. The movie is in UK cinemas after Easter.

Cavendish is now in MSR after the withdrawal of the new penultimate climb :
http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/excl...milan-san-remo

According to the radio times Eurosport are showing another of the minor one day races from Belgium today - Le Samyn

It's part of the UCI Europe Tour

There's about 5 or 6 world tour teams riding...........be interesting to see how Andy Fenn gets on if it comes down to a sprint finish as he looks like the main contender for a British sprinter when Cav retires or loses his speed

coverage starts 1.45 - ES2

Looks a decent course for Le Samyn......some Pavé, some climbs, typical Belgian one day racing !

Joining the race with 90K to go ...........so that probably two and a half hours

Apparently the last 200 metres is a stiff uphill climb which might rule out Andy Fenn

Wales should also have a pretty decent team along with Scotland, although not the strength in depth of those above nations.

Of course if there was a team sprint Becky James could race with her sister, who is not bad herself, to be honest a bit surprised there is no team sprint, although I think the point about team pursuit is more salient.

Another one day race on ES today........Strade Bianche from Italy

Scenic route from Chianti to Sienna and includes approx. 30 miles of gravel road, which gives it it's name

The race was started in 2007 and from 2008 it moved to the early season to act as an Italian version of the Belgian Classics with the unmade roads and hills.......

It's usually the tougher type of rider that wins it - Gilbert, Cancellara, Moser, Iglinsky are the last few winners, it's not a race for the sprinters

I was hoping for more of a fight on the final climb than what we saw. Sagan seemed to lose momentum as Kwiatkowski kicked and instantly it was all over.

I suspect this pair's much anticipated domination of the sport has begun.

Roma Maxima tomorrow. Pozatto's least favourite race.

I must say when I saw the finale there I was thinking "Glad I don't have to deliver pianos to that street"

I see the Eurosport ads for P-N have not caught up with the race reshuffle at Sky. The organisers are unhappy Porte is not defending his title.

Vincenzo Nibali is the biggest name on the start list.

Both Shlecks line up for Trek Factory.

http://www.procyclingstats.com/race/...2014-Startlist

Just looking for the TV coverage..........it doesn't look as though stage one of P-N is on live as they have the Italian one-day race (which is a lesser race !) on 'live'

There's some highlights on this evening

I think I'll 'avoid the score' for P-N and watch the highlights which immediately precede the live coverage from tomorrow........

What a finish in the Roma Maxima! 3rd yesterday and now 1st today for Valverde :up

Great finish. The course designers put those sharp narrow town climbs at the perfect distance from the finish. Shame the onscreen GPS times were all over the shop and the helicopters made no attempt to show the gap to the peloton.

Did anyone hear that bit on the commentary when they came back from an ad break but didn't realise they were on air ?

How boring !.........all they talked about was trying to identify riders in the breaks.....who's that BMC rider, is it Bloggs,.......no I think it might be Smith

Boooooring !

Been much better if Smithy was saying how he hates working with Carlton because he's such a tw*t.........

After they'd realised they were back on Declan thanked twitter users for tweeting to let them know they were back on air ............spoilsports !

One of the weekend highlights for me was that idiot not being on

Well he is ten times better than Quentin Quigley. Eurosport need to stop being idiots and use Dave Harmon again

Don't know what's happened to Dave Harmon......he decided he wanted a break around this time last year.........he said he'd be back for last year's Tour but he hasn't been back at all

That's because Eurosport are choosing not to use him, reading between the lines they got the arse with him for having some time off.

He says on his Twitter he is available but like all Eurosport commentators he is freelance and they can use who they like.

Eurosport do seem to be going for cheap and cheerful from a commentary box in south London.

Silence from the commentators at last weeks KBK when Boonen and others were being interviewed at length. If not a full translation, Harmon and Kelly could be relied upon to give at least the general gist of what was being said.

At Roma Maxima yesterday the commentators said Valverde and Pozzovivo could not be caught by the peloton at a minute with 6km to go. The experienced Harmon often referred to the 10 seconds a kilometre rule for the catch - and at one second, splitting the pair, the general rule was proven.

Bet he's not as good as Quentin's brother, Declan, though