Commonwealth medallist Dan Bigham aims to earn on-track role at Paris Olympics

Dan Bigham went to the Tokyo Olympics working for a rival team but now has his sights set on competing for Great Britain at Paris 2024.

Having established himself as a technical and tactical innovator in team pursuiting, Bigham’s skills as an aerodynamicist were in demand in the lead up to Tokyo and he went to Japan as a consultant for Denmark, who won silver in the men’s event.

At the time the 30-year-old believed his own days of riding the team pursuit were over as he focused on his bid to break the UCI World Hour Record, but a post-Olympic shake-up at British Cycling has reopened doors.

On Friday, Bigham donned an England jersey and joined Charlie Tanfield, Ethan Vernon and Ollie Wood to win team pursuit silver at the Commonwealth Games, with their time of three minutes 49.584 the fastest a British team has clocked anywhere other than Tokyo.

And Bigham believes it shows he could be at the next Olympics as a rider.

“Team pursuit wasn’t a goal until the National Track Championships back in March when I had a very good individual pursuit – I broke the British record and went third quickest in history,” Bigham told the PA news agency.

“That was kind of an ‘Oh s***’ moment. Maybe I should be a pursuiter again. I’d put it on the shelf and thought working with Denmark was the end of the road. To have had the door reopened with British Cycling has been fabulous.

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“I obviously stood on the other side of the fence for a year or two with the Danes but now I’m back in the fold on this side to try and help these guys go fast and be part of that. It’s genuinely good fun and I’m looking forward to the years going into Paris. Hopefully I can be part of that.”

For years Bigham’s relationship