Meares upends Pendleton in Melbourne

Meares set a national record to qualify fastest at the Melbourne World Cup round and then beat arch-rival Vicki Pendleton of Great Britain in the final.

Beating Pendleton is a major psychological boost for Meares two years out from the London Olympics, but her 10.985 seconds for the flying 200m was an even bigger milestone.

While Meares may well have turned a corner, British cyclist Sir Chris Hoy simply proved again he is the man to beat in the sprint events.

Hoy won his second gold medal of this World Cup with a majestic performance in the keirin, including a withering burst of speed from back in the field late in the final that secured him the win.

It was the first time Meares had beaten Pendleton head-to-head in a match sprint since 2004.

Pendleton has won five of the last six world sprint titles and beat Meares for the sprint gold medal at the Beijing Olympics.

Meares won their gold medal in Friday night's ride-off two heats to nil, but said the qualifying time was an even bigger milestone.

The Australian has made qualifying a focus ahead of the London Games, saying she needs to make sure of quick times so she avoids tougher opposition in the early match sprint rounds.

"If I nothing else had come (other than) the qualifying, I was going to be particularly satisfied with how I'd performed," Meares said.

"For me, it's a big achievement to beat Vicki.

"To be able to put together the compete package is particularly good."

Meares and Pendleton are arch-rivals and their relationship at times has appeared prickly, but the British star was all class after the final.

As they circled the track, Pendleton pointed to Meares as a sign of respect and congratulated her.

"It was really nice, she shook my hand and she pointed to my rainbow stripes on my arm (denoting Meares is a former world champion) and said 'you certainly deserve those'," Meares said.

"That was particularly nice, given we really haven't spoken a lot."

Pendleton also heaped praise on Meares after the final.

She is clearly well off her top form and came into this event carrying a back injury, but was making no excuses.

"Anna is probably the most experienced rider on the scene, she was well on her way to achieving great things before I even started," Pendleton said.

"She's still here, at the top of the game, and she's never been far out of the medals - that shows real class in an athlete."

In an eventful night's racing, Chinese star Shuang Guo broke her collarbone when she crashed in the opening heat of her semi-final against Pendleton.

Guo badly misjudged her line and clipped Pendleton's back wheel.

There were no such mishaps for Hoy, the four-time Olympic champion, who is rebuilding his form after a relatively-quiet year.

"It's good to start being a bit more flexible with my tactics - that final was the fastest-ever keirin, a 10.0 (seconds) for the last 200m and I think that's about three 10ths quicker than anyone has done before," he said.

"I just had to be patient, as if you panic and you go too soon, then you can get stuck on the outside and you have to slow down.

"So I just really hit it as hard as I could with just over a lap to go and by the time I hit the 200m line I was really flying."

Teun Mulder of the Netherlands was second and the bronze medal went to France's Mickael Bourgain. Australia's Scott Sunderland finished fifth.

In the men's omnium, New Zealand's Shane Archbold proved himself to be the iron-man of the competition, taking out the gold medal.

The omnium consists of six events held across two days - a flying lap, points race, elimination race, individual pursuit, scratch race and time trial.

Riders are awarded points based on where they place in each event and the rider with the lowest total at the end claims the gold medal.

With consistency the key, Archbold placed in the top five in all six events, to finish on 24 points, well ahead of Canada's Zac Bell (31 points) who claimed the silver medal. Reigning World Champion Ed Clancy from Great Britain was third with 35 points.

"Obviously I needed to approach the competition aggressively coming up against a world champion, but all I wanted to do was produce personal bests in all of the timed events and I did that," said Archbold.

Results UCI Track World Cup day two:

Men's Keirin:

1. Chris Hoy (GBR), 2. Teun Mulder (NED), 3. Mickael Bourgain (FRA).

Men's Omnium:

1. Shane Archbold (NZL) 24 points, 2. Zac Bell (CAN) 31, 3. Ed Clancy (GBR) 35

Women's Sprint

1. Anna Meares (AUS), 2. Victoria Pendleton (GBR), 3. Kristina Vogel (GER)