Cycling: Kiwi cyclists on track for an action-packed 12 months

Sam Webster sees his London disappointment as a powerful motivator. Photo / Greg Bowker

It's a fine time to be among New Zealand's elite track cyclists.

If they project out 12 months from now, they have the Oceania champs in Invercargill, a World Cup programme, including a first event in New Zealand at the start of December; world championships in London and finally, the biggie, the Rio Olympics.

This week, the various squads have regrouped at the Avantidrome in Cambridge having been training and competing in races around the globe.

As an example, take the men's sprint squad, world champions last year, winners before being relegated for an infringement during their final against Germany this year.

In the past 11 weeks, they've had three weeks in the United States, a week each in Germany and Poland, a month in Majorca, another couple of weeks in the US then home for a short break, and now they set sail for Rio. Good for the air miles, tough on the bodies.

Sam Webster was a reserve at the London Olympics. Since then he's become a world champion - with Ethan Mitchell and Eddie Dawkins last year - and a Commonwealth Games gold medallist twice over, in the team and individual sprints, at the Commonwealths in Glasgow last year.

But at 24 there's plenty of racing ahead and the spur of making up for that London disappointment is a powerful motivator. "That's the big one," Webster said of Rio. "I'm still not an Olympian, I don't have a team number so now there's eight years of focus behind this campaign for me. That's what you prepare for, you lock in your career four years at a time."

Webster, Mitchell and Dawkins might appear to have an iron grip on the team sprint spots.

But the other two in the group, Simon van Velthooven, bronze medallist in the keirin in London, and Matt Archibald, will have a different thought on that.

"There's no guaranteed spots in our team. You have to work hard and earn them. Nobody gets a charity spot or a chance just for the sake of it.

"That's the way our programme operates and everybody understands that and it's why you really enjoy it when you get a chance to race. You want to beat all the other guys because that could help your chances of getting in the team."

Within a couple of hours of assembling on Thursday, the pursuit riders were out doing laps on the track, all resplendent in their rainbow jerseys, as befits their world champion status won in Paris at the start of this year.

Webster knows what it's like to wear one of those.

"Seeing the team pursuit guys here with their jerseys on every day is a very motivating thing to keep working hard, keep our diligence at the utmost level and to make all those steps that are going to be crucial going forward to Rio."