Trinidad and Tobago's Nicholas Paul bags Nations Cup keirin bronze

Trinidad and Tobago’s Nicholas Paul captured his first medal for the 2023 season when he battled to men’s keirin bronze at the UCI Track Nations Cup in Milton, Canada, on Saturday.

In the medal race, Paul positioned himself directly behind the durney bike for the first three laps. As they crossed the line for the fourth of six laps, the durney exited and the bunch pounced on Paul and passed him.

Paul used this lap to regain control of the race and pushed his pedals hard to get back into first place.

He eventually led for the penultimate lap and into the final one but was eventually caught by a surging Matthew Richardson (Australia) and German Maximilian Dornback, who copped gold and silver respectively.

This was Paul’s first medal for the new year and it came in his second meet since recovering from an injury sustained in October 2022.

In the opening round of the keirin competition, both Paul and compatriot Kwesi Browne placed fourth in their respective heats and were made to contest the repechage round for a final chance at qualifying. Only the top rider from each opening heat gained automatic qualification.

In the repechage round, Paul sealed his second-round spot by topping heat two with a 10.031s performance while Browne’s second-place showing was still not good enough to advance.

Browne was beaten to the line by Paul’s Switzerland-based World Cycling Centre training partner Jair Tjon En Fa of Suriname.

Into the second round, Paul contested heat one of two, and despite leading for the majority of the race, he was edged into third in a mad dash to the finish line.

His performance secured him a spot in the medal race since only the top three riders from each heat advanced to the final.

Paul and Browne return to the track on Sunday from 10am (TT time) to contest the men’s sprint first round (flying 200m). The former is the current world record holder (9.1 seconds) in this event.

On Friday night, Akil Campbell placed 14th in the men’s elimination race with Dutchman Matthijs Buchli, Australian Blake Agnoletto an Spaniard Erik Martorell Haga claiming the top three spots, in that order.

On Saturday, in heat two of the men’s omnium – a 60-lap (15km) event – Campbell finished third of the 12 advancing cyclists.

However, according to the UCI results sheet, Campbell was eventually relegated after he “entered the sprinter’s lane when the opponent was already there.”

Endurance rider Alexi Ramirez also hits the track on Sunday in heat two of the women’s omnium.