Completely exhausted but overjoyed, Emma Hinze, Lea Sophie Friedrich and Pauline Grabosch hugged each other on the wooden oval.
With a world record show, the German team sprint women made a dream start at the track cycling world championships on the Olympic track in Paris. Hinze, Friedrich and Grabosch raced to the third title in a row and impressively continued their series of successes in the sprint area.
The trio was stopped after three laps on the wooden oval of Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines in the world record time of 45.967 seconds, leaving the Chinese Yufang Guo, Shanju Bao and Liying Yuan (46.631) no chance. The German team sprinters had already dominated the competition in 2020 in Berlin and 2021 – 663 days before the Olympic showdown, Hinze and Co. were already well prepared.
Gala performance on the Olympic track
It was a gala performance by the three sprint aces. While there was still a moment of shock during qualification when the start was false, the Golden Girls showed their full potential in the second run. In 45.983 seconds, the trio even topped the world record run from the World Championships in Roubaix a year ago (46.064). And in the final it went a bit faster again.
For the German women’s four, on the other hand, the winning streak came to an end as expected after the personnel change. The two Tokyo Olympic champions Mieke Kröger and Franziska Brauße, together with Lena Charlotte Reissner and Lea Lin Teutenberg, were timed in qualifying with a time of 4:16.898 minutes and thus took fifth place. This means that the quartet can only race for third place on Thursday.
But the German team sprinters started with the best line-up. In all runs, the BDR drivers were the fastest – and all within a good three hours.
This could again be golden world championships for the German sprinters. In the past two years, Hinze and Friedrich had decided all the world titles among themselves.
Women’s foursome ends
After the recent coup, the two track cycling stars each have six World Championship titles. And in France, both still have a lot planned: The disciplines sprint, 500-meter time trial and keirin are on the program for Hinze and Friedrich until Sunday.
For the women’s four, on the other hand, a great series of successes came to an end, as the team had won almost everything. After gold in Tokyo, the foursome, who were named Team of the Year at the Sports Gala, also triumphed at the 2021 World Cup and at the 2021 and 2022 European Championships. After the 2022 European Championships in Munich, however, multiple world champion Lisa Brennauer ended her career. In addition, Lisa Klein decided not to start at the World Cup due to health problems. And successor Laura üßmilch has not yet fully recovered from her fall injury at the Tour de France.
The German men’s foursome, which was also changed in terms of personnel, did even worse. Theo Reinhardt, Tobias Buck-Gramcko, Nicolas Heinrich and Leon Rohde clearly missed the finals in 3:52.057 minutes with the seventh best time.
The German team sprint men also go home without a medal. But fourth place was a sign of caution. Surprisingly, Australia won the world title.
