Kurt Pickard faces a nervous week ahead after the Tauranga BMX rider failed to enhance his London Olympic credentials by failing to progress out of the qualifying heats at the UCI world championships in Birmingham.
Pickard, coming back from injury after a serious crash at the Supercross World Cup in Norway, was looking for a big result in Birmingham to push his case for inclusion in the BMX team for London.
But the 21-year-old, who nailed a quarterfinal spot at the worlds in Copenhagen last year, struck disaster in his qualifying race.
He was among the fastest of all the riders to the first corner but pulled his foot out of the pedal on the second straight and lost all chance to post a competitive qualifying time, finishing in 46.750sec to be 157th of the 159 riders who completed qualifying.
World No 3-ranked Marc Willers was the only Kiwi male to qualify and, after dominating his semifinal, crashed in the final while attempting a brave passing move on defending champion Joris Daudet for second place.
Pickard spent three days leading up to the world champs training on the revamped Olympic track.
Whether the former Tauranga Boys' College student gets to race on the London track in August is now in the hands of BikeNZ's selectors and, ultimately, the New Zealand Olympic Committee.
Willers' top-eight result in the final event to qualify for Olympic points was good enough to confirm New Zealand two men's spots in the BMX at the Olympics, but the big question now is whether he has laid down a strong enough challenge for the expected second position.
Pickard is clearly the next-best international rider after Willers but there is a question mark over his lack of consistency and whether he can satisfy the NZ Olympic Committee's criteria of a top-16 finish in London.
There is a feeling BikeNZ and the NZOC may choose to disregard the weekend's world champs result given the compact and short 310m-long Birmingham course bore little resemblance to the new 400m track at Olympic Park.
BikeNZ will nominate its BMX team on Friday, with a decision on who goes to London on Tuesday.
Meanwhile, New Zealand's riders are returning from the world championships in England fired up about hosting the 2013 event for the first time.
The BikeNZ team finished with six medals from Birmingham, all in the challenge classes, leaving them second in the national teams in the challenge class behind the United States.
In elite racing, while the Kiwis enjoyed four medals last year, the Birmingham track was not as profitable after Willers crashed when in a medal position and Kawerau's Sarah Walker still recovering from injury.
Auckland will host next year's BMX world championships indoors at Vector Arena on July 25-28 and organiser Jane Patterson said there was real interest in the 2013 event.
"It was fantastic for New Zealand to have a presence at the world championships," Patterson said. "Our position as a southern hemisphere venue created interest given the European dominance as hosts for the championships in recent years."
From a racing perspective, Patterson said it was an excellent opportunity to look at the infrastructure of an indoor venue, and she believed Vector Arena would provide a superb scene both for those competing and for spectators.