Track door closing

Cycling Australia has named a powerful 16-rider squad for the February 16-18 World Cup round at the London Olympic velodrome.

Team members and support staff will use the event primarily to familiarise themselves with the venue six months out from the Games.

But the team selections were also unpleasant news for some riders.

Former world team pursuit champions Ashlee Ankudinoff and Sarah Kent, current world omnium champion Michael Freiberg and team sprint world championship bronze medallists Dan Ellis and Jason Niblett all missed out on the London World Cup team.

After the London World Cup, selectors will pick another squad for the April 4-8 world championships in Melbourne.

London and Melbourne are the major milestones for the Australian track squad ahead of the Olympics.

"The bottom line is, we're still experimenting at the very high end of what we do," said CA national performance director Kevin Tabotta.

"We're certainly not dropping people in for development purposes, but at the same time we still have to answer some questions.

"Who can deal with a speed which is at world record or world championship pace - those sorts of questions don't get answered in training camps necessarily."

Some members of the team picked themselves, particularly sprinters Anna Meares, Kaarle McCulloch and Shane Perkins.

But Alex Bird probably forced his way into the World Cup team through his upset win in the sprint at last week's Australian championships.

Annette Edmondson has also become a bolter in women's track endurance and last week she broke the Australian all-comers' record twice for the individual pursuit.

Another big area of interest is men's track endurance and in particular the team pursuit.

Reigning world champions Jack Bobridge, Rohan Dennis, Luke Durbridge and Michael Hepburn are in the team, joined by Alex Edmondson and Glenn O'Shea.

They are now at a training camp in Adelaide until February 11 and only five of them will go to the World Cup.

Bobridge, Dennis, Edmondson and O'Shea clocked an incredible Australian all-comers' record of three minutes and 56 seconds last week to win the national title.

CA are determined that no-one in the men's track endurance squad becomes complacent about his form.

"The bottom line for this group is we're saying no-one is a walk-up start," Tabotta said.

"We are trying to ensure we keep the focus on the performance."

An obvious absentee from the World Cup team is world champion Cameron Meyer, but he is concentrating on road competition for the next few weeks.

Matthew Glaetzer and Scott Sunderland join Perkins and Bird in the sprint group, while Amy Cure, Josie Tomic and Melissa Hoskins are the other women's track endurance selections.