New Zealand has enjoyed some heady moments in its long Commonwealth Games history, but surely nothing better than what occurred at London's Lee Valley VeloPark on the first afternoon of the Games.
They won two gold medals – the men’s 4000m team pursuit and the women’s team sprint – a silver against all odds in the women 4000m team pursuit and a bronze in the men’s team sprint.
It was stunning stuff and left the New Zealand fans in the velodrome delirious with excitement as the good times kept on coming. What amazing news for New Zealanders back home to wake to on a Saturday morning.
The men’s team pursuit – Aaron Gate, Campbell Stewart, Jordan Kerby and Tom Sexton – outclassed England in the final, winning in 3min 47.575s, a Games record by more than two seconds, and well under the magic 3min 50s barrier.
The English, who began the final full of hope, were crushed in spirit long before the end as the New Zealanders put together an immaculately executed race plan.
As Gate said, he knew they must be heading for gold when the crowd suddenly went quiet.
While still celebrating their first gold medal of the Games, New Zealand fans then watched Ellesse Andrews, Olivia King and BMX star Rebecca Petch, who’d set a national record in the heat, blitz Canada in the team sprint final. The New Zealanders were timed at 47.425s, a Games record, and the Canadians at 48.001s. In sprint cycling terms, that’s an enormous margin.
For Andrews it was the culmination of a bizarre, never-to-be forgotten day, in which she stepped up to help out the New Zealand women’s 4000m team pursuit in an emergency.
The pursuit team only confirmed they would race when Andrews, in Birmingham as a sprinter, agreed to start to give them the compulsory four riders. The team’s plans had been thrown into disarray when Ally Wollaston scratched after fracturing her wrist in the Tour de France Femmes road race this week.
Andrews, a former junior world pursuit champion before she turned to sprinting, completed two laps as per the plan in the heat and the remaining three riders, Michaela Drummond, Emily Shearman and Bryony Botha, judged their pace perfectly to clock 4min 18.434s and, against all odds, progress to the final.
Andrews was out on the track again in the team pursuit final and again did two laps – let’s not forget she had the women’s team sprint, her real target, coming up very soon afterwards.
Once Andrews pulled aside the remaining three New Zealanders struggled against the powerful Australians and were beaten by 5.7s. Nevertheless the New Zealand women were timed at 4min 17.984s, better than they managed in their heat.
That silver medal, when it was doubtful in the morning whether they would even field a team, is really special.
As if there hadn’t been enough to whoop and cheer about, the men’s sprint trio of Bradly Knipe, Sam Dakin and Sam Webster rounded off an incredible session for New Zealand when they turned in a stunning performance in the bronze medal ride, utterly outclassing Canada. Webster looked supreme as he brought home the sprint on the final lap.