The men's individual pursuit at the 2008 Summer Olympics took place on August 16 at the Laoshan Velodrome. The pre-event favorite to win the gold medal was the defending Olympic champion Bradley Wiggins of Great Britain, who managed to retain the title, setting a new Olympic record in the preliminary round.

Qualification Eighteen cyclists qualified for this event. Bradley Wiggins (Great Britain), the defending Olympic champion, qualified for winning the individual pursuit at the 2008 UCI Track Cycling World Championships. Volodymyr Dyudya (Ukraine) qualified at the late 2007 UCI World Cup event in Sydney, winning the individual pursuit there. The qualifier by way of the UCI B World Championship was Alexandr Pliuschin (Moldova). Jenning Huizenga (Netherlands), Taylor Phinney (United States), Phillip Thuaux (Australia), Sergi Escobar Roure (Spain), Alexander Serov (Russia), and David O'Loughlin (Ireland) qualified based on UCI rankings. The rest of the field was formed by berths given to the ten nations that qualified in the team pursuit. This resulted in Great Britain, Australia, Netherlands, Spain, Ukraine, and Russia each having two competitors in this event.

Competition format The eighteen cyclists were matched into nine two-man heats. The riders start on opposite sides of the track from one another, held in place by a starting gate until the race begins. While the objective is ostensibly to catch the other rider on the track, victory is most commonly determined by the faster time to cover 4,000 meters. The winners of each individual heat did not matter in the preliminaries - it was instead the overall eight fastest times which would advance to the match round.

In the match round, the top eight riders from the preliminaries were matched together, 1 vs. 8, 2 vs. 7, 3 vs. 6, and 4 vs. 5, for the semifinals. In the semifinals, the winner of each match advanced to race for a medal; the two fastest raced for gold and silver, while the two slower winners faced each other for the bronze.

Schedule All times are China standard time (UTC+8) Date Time RoundFriday, 15 August 2008 16:55 Qualification Saturday, 16 August 2008 16:30 Match round Saturday, 16 August 2008 18:50 Final

Results Qualification

Rank Heat Cyclist Nation Result Notes 1 9 Bradley Wiggins 4:15.031 Q, 2 8 Hayden Roulston 4:18.990 Q 3 9 Alexei Markov 4:21.498 Q 4 6 Volodymyr Dyudya 4:21.530 Q 5 2 Steven Burke 4:22.260 Q 6 3 Antonio Tauler 4:22.462 Q 7 6 Taylor Phinney 4:22.860 Q 8 5 Alexander Serov 4:23.732 Q 9 7 Bradley McGee 4:26.084 10 5 Sergi Escobar 4:26.102 11 7 David O'Loughlin 4:26.102 12 1 Brett Lancaster 4:26.139 13 3 Jens Mouris 4:27.445 14 4 Vitaliy Popkov 4:30.321 15 1 Fabien Sanchez 4:33.100 16 2 Carlos Alzate 4:35.154 17 4 Alexandr Pliuschin 4:35.438 18 8 Jenning Huizenga 4:37.097

Match round Semifinals Qualification rule: Two fastest cyclists advance to the gold medal match (Q), while the next two to the bronze medal match (q).

Rank Heat Cyclist Nation Result Notes 1 4 Bradley Wiggins 4:16.571 Q 2 3 Hayden Roulston 4:19.232 Q 3 1 Steven Burke 4:21.558 q 4 2 Alexei Markov 4:22.308 q 5 1 Volodymyr Dyudya 4:22.471 6 2 Antonio Tauler 4:24.974 7 4 Alexander Serov 4:25.391 8 3 Taylor Phinney 4:26.644

Medal round Bronze medal match Rank Cyclist Nation Result Notes Steven Burke 4:20.947 4 Alexei Markov 4:24.149

Gold medal match Rank Cyclist Nation Result Notes Bradley Wiggins 4:16.977 Hayden Roulston 4:19.611

References

External links NBC Olympics: Cycling