Irish trio clock new national record in Cali

Jennifer O’Reilly, Ciara Horne and Caroline Ryan underlined their continuing strong progress in track cycling with an excellent performance in the World Cup in Cali, Colombia yesterday.

The trio went over five seconds quicker than their national record set at the European championships in Pruszkow, Poland, last month.

They covered the 3,000 metre distance in a time of three minutes 31.708 seconds, besting their previous record by over five seconds.

The time is understood to be inside that needed to secure carding. They also finished fifth of the European teams, thus earning important qualifying points for the London Olympics.

Irish riders Martyn Irvine and Felix English were also in action. Irvine won the qualifying heat for the omnium (multi-discipline) events and was seventh in the flying lap, while English was 13th in the scratch race.