Meares leads Aussie gold rush in Delhi

Meares, West Australian Scott Sunderland and South Australian Jack Bobridge swept all three gold medals on offer on the opening day of track competition at the Indira Gandhi Sports Complex on Tuesday.

All three set Commonwealth Games records - Meares in the women's 500m time trial, Sunderland in the men's 1000m time trial and Bobridge in the qualifying for the 4000m individual pursuit.

Three-time world champion Meares sizzled around as expected in 33.758sec to defend her Commonwealth title and lead home an Aussie 1-2 finish.

Meares's training partner, 22-year-old Kaarle McCulloch from New South Wales, won the silver in 34.780sec, with Wales's Becky James the bronze in 35.236sec.

Then Perth 22-year-old Scott Sunderland added another gold to get the youthful Australia team off to a flyer, breaking Sir Chris Hoy's Commonwealth record with a 1min 1.411sec 'kilo' to beat Malaysia's Mohd Rizal Tisin and New Zealand's Eddie Dawkins.

Bobridge, 21, capped off a perfect day as he held off a late charge from New Zealand's Jesse Sergent to win the pursuit by just under four-tenths of a second.

Australian Michael Hepburn won bronze when he beat New Zealand's Sam Bewley in the ride-off between third and fourth.

Bobridge had earlier broken the Commonwealth record in qualifying with a flying 4min 14.845sec, which clipped more than a second and a half of Australian Brad McGee's previous record set in Manchester eight years ago.

He posted a far slower time in the gold medal race, but his 4min 17.495sec was enough to see off Sergent's 4min 17.893sec.

Meares, 27, went into her pet event a warm favourite to win back-to-back Commonwealth titles and break her own Games record.

The Adelaide-based rider, who won the nation's adulation with her remarkable comeback for silver at the 2008 Olympics just seven months after breaking her neck in a high-speed crash, didn't disappoint.

Her Commonwealth gold adds further lustre to a decorated career, with Meares now confident she is well on track to make her cycling comeback further storied at the London Olympics in 2012.

"I don't think I've reached my peak - I'm only 27 currently and for a female track cyclist, you're looking at your late 20s, early 30s to get your peak performance," Meares said.

"With another two years under my belt, I'm quite confident - especially with rides like today - those little improvements are going to still happen."

Meares is eyeing three gold medals in Delhi, and looks certain to pocket a second on Wednesday when she and McCulloch partner in the team sprint.

"Anna and I are big believers we have to be in the top five in the world to be competitive in the team sprint, so we're sitting pretty good at the moment for London," McCulloch said.

"Anna's a great opponent and she is world champion in this event, so she's pretty hard to beat."

Collated results
Men's 1000m Time Trial Final
1 Scott Sunderland (Aus) 1:1.41
2 Mohd Tisin (Mkd) 1:2.76
3 Edward Dawkins (Nzl) 1:2.77
4 Myron Simpson (Nzl) 1:3.44
5 Travis Smith (Can) 1:3.65
6 Bernard Pierre Esterhuizen (Rsa) 1:4.42
7 Marc Ryan (Nzl) 1:4.52
8 Callum Skinner (Sco) 1:5.09
9 Bikram Singh O (Ind) 1:7.91
10 Philip Lavery (Nir) 1:8.98

Women's 500m Time Trial Final
1 Anna Meares (Aus) 33.75
2 Kaarle McCulloch (Aus) 34.78
3 Becky James (Wal) 35.23
4 Monique Sullivan (Can) 36.23
5 Jenny Davis (Sco) 36.41
6 Alison Shanks (Nzl) 36.56
7 Anna Blyth (Gbr) 36.80
8 Charline Joiner (Sco) 37.53
9 Wendy Houvenaghel (Gbr) 38.28
10 Mahitha Mohan (Ind) 38.78
11 Ch.Rameshwori Devi 38.91
12 Heather Wilson (Nir) 40.18.