Trinidad and Tobago earn team sprint silver at Pan Am Track Cycling

TRINIDAD AND Tobago pedalled to silver in the men’s Team Sprint event at the Elite Pan American Track Cycling Championships at the Villa Deportiva Nacional Videna in Lima, Peru on Friday.

In the gold medal ride against Colombia, TT’s trio of Zion Pulido, Njisane Phillip and Keron Bramble clocked a blistering 45.442 seconds.

However the Colombian team of Juan Ochoa, Ruben Murillo and Santiago Ramirez proved better on the evening and captured gold in 45.227 seconds.

In the opening qualifying round, TT clocked the second fastest time of 45.8222 seconds to secure a place in the final. Topping the field was Colombia (44.933 seconds), while Argentina (45.939 seconds) and Mexico (46.314 seconds) rounded off the top four advancing nations.

This result propelled them to the heat three of the semi-final round where they raced against Ecuador for a spot in gold or bronze medal ride. Here, TT recorded their fastest performance on the night by stopping the clock on 44.931 seconds. Ecuador clocked 47.565 seconds.

TT however, were the defending men’s Team Sprint champions.

Additionally, lone female representative and pro rider Alexi Costa captured her first Pan American medal when she pedalled to bronze in the women’s Scratch Race.

Costa secured her first Pan Am podium place by finishing the challenging 10 kilometres (40 laps) race behind winner Ambar Joseph of Barbados and silver medallist Victoria Velasco Fuentes of Mexico.

Rounding off the top five were Canada’s Maggie Coles-Lyster and Colombia’s Yesi Duenas Gomez.