Rio 2016: Laura Trott leads omnium as track cycling enters final day

Laura Trott and her fiancé Jason Kenny will today try to take their combined Olympic gold medal haul into double figures as the track racing programme at Rio comes to a close with the second day of the women’s omnium and the men’s keirin. There’s also the women’s sprint, now at the quarter final stage, with Team GB very much in the hunt for medals.

The pair nicknamed cycling’s golden couple get married next month and both have already successfully defended titles won at London 2012 in the past few days – Trott in the team pursuit, to take her personal total of Olympic golds to three, while Kenny got his fourth and fifth in the individual and team sprints.

Today, Kenny rides the keirin – an event in which he was world champion in in 2013 – as will the team mate he beat to individual sprint gold on Sunday, Callum Skinner.

Victory today would see Kenny join Sir Chris Hoy on six gold medals – the Scot’s last coming in this event in London, when countries were only allowed one rider in individual events.

With three events completed in the omnium, Trott, the defending champion leads by eight points from Belgium’s Jolien D’Hoore, with the American rider Sarah Hammer third, a further two points back.

With 118 points, Trott has only failed to pick up maximum points in yesterday’s opener, the points race.

She won the sprint to take second place behind Tatsiana Sharakova of Belarus who had attacked earlier, with Hammer, whom many expected to be Trott’s biggest rival for gold.

In the individual pursuit, raced in reverse order, Trott lapped Sharakova well before the end but more importantly went faster than the American, five times a world champion in the discipline.

The final event was the one Trott has made her trademark, the elimination race, once again producing perfectly timed sprints as one by one her rivals fell by the wayside.

Hammer’s elimination meant Trott and D’Hoore were left to fight out the final sprint – won by the Briton, but the Belgian’s second place along her to leapfrog the American in the standings.

The remaining events today are the 500 metre time trial, the flying lap, and the 20km points race.

James and Marchant in sprint QFs

In the women’s individual sprint, Becky James and Katy Marchant are both safely through to the quarter finals, with the medals being decided later in the day.

With James setting a new Olympic record in qualifying yesterday and Marchant second fastest, they are kept apart in the draw meaning there’s a prospect of another all-Team GB final as there was in the men’s event on Mondy when Kenny beat Callum.

Here’s today’s programme. All timings are BST.

1400 - Women's sprint, Quarter-finals 

1418 - Men's keirin,  Round 1 

1457 - Women's omnium, Time trial      

2000 - Women's sprint,  Semi-finals

2010 - Women's omnium, Flying lap  

2046 - Men's keirin, Round 2       

2105 - Women's omnium, Points race    

2144 - Women's sprint,  Final    

2220 - Men's keirin,  Final