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Pendleton leaves pretenders trailing

Source: guardian.co.uk Sport

Oct 20, 2009

Summary

• World No1 rider shocked by her speed in victory
• Endurance riders outshine sprinters in men's event

Victoria Pendleton brushed off the challenge of the emerging generation at the Manchester Velodrome last night, in the opening session of the British track cycling championships, to claim her seventh women's 500 metres time-trial title. To do so the 29-year-old had to see off two highly rated pretenders, Jess Varnish and Becky James, who were aged 11 and 10 respectively when the Olympic gold medallist's run of success in this event began in 2002 – they are now 18 and 17 and, in James's case, a double junior world champion.

However, Pendleton's margin of victory underlined her continuing pre-eminence, her 34.262sec just over two-tenths of a second down on her personal best, and almost a second clear of Varnish, with James a further nine-tenths of a second back. This despite it being Pendleton's first competitive outing in more than six months, since the successful and emotionally charged defence of her world sprint title in Pruszkow in March. In contrast, Varnis

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