Fans guide to track endurance events
Published 17 April 2012
There are six main types of endurance race:
Individual Pursuit: The ultimate head-to-head endurance race. Riders begin from a standing start on opposite sides of the Track and literally ‘pursue’ each other – the men for 4000 metres and the women for 3000 metres. In the finals, the first rider to complete 4000m wins, unless one rider is caught by the other, at which point the race is over.
Team Pursuit: Team version of the individual pursuit. Men race in teams of four over 4000m and women in teams of three over 3000m. The major difference to the individual version is that the riders share the workload, with the lead rider staying at the front for only a lap or so before swinging up the track and re-joining at the back. A technical event, team-mates often ride only centimetres apart to maximise slipstreaming effects. In the men’s event, times are taken on the third rider of the team to cross the line: the slowest rider in a team often sacrifices himself towards the end and pulls up the track to let his team-mates complete the race.
Points Race: A bunch race featuring 20-30 riders competing over 20, 30 or 40km. Riders aim to gain points, with the highest scoring rider winning the event. Points can be scored at ‘Intermediate’ sprints, often every 10, 20 or 25 laps. Large numbers of bonus points (typically 20) can also be scored by lapping the field. This is a very tactical event, with alliances formed and broken, and dramatic attacks chased down by the field. It requires speed, stamina, the ability to sprint quickly to grab points and a cool head.
Madison: Effectively a Points Race for two-man teams, though only one rider per pairing is ever actually racing. The other rider circles the track high up the banking until he’s caught by his team-mate at which point he swoops down and takes over after a hand sling (a kind of handshake-cum-slinging motion where the rider who’s ‘in’ takes transfers his momentum to his team-mate). It’s highly technical, but very exciting and almost balletic at times. Again, the winner is the team with the most points – though unlike the Points Race, laps gained actually have priority over points scored.
Scratch Race: A simple bunch race, usually held over 10, 15, 20 or 25 km with the first over the line the winner.
Omnium: A discipline where riders compete over a series of races to determine the best all-rounder. Points are awarded so that the winner of each individual event scores one point, second scores two, third scores three, etc. The rider with the lowest aggregate score at the end of the competition is the winner. A relatively new event at World Championship level, it makes its debut at the Olympics in London 2012. The event is typically made up of: 200m Time Trial; Scratch Race; Individual Pursuit; Points Race; Kilo (or 500m Time Trial in the women's event). It’s normally contested over a single day.
