Laura Kenny ‘never felt so much pressure to win a bronze medal’

Dame Laura Kenny claimed she had been as nervous as she was before an Olympic gold medal ride as she helped England to a Commonwealth bronze in the women’s team pursuit.

The five-time Olympic champion has endured a traumatic time since the Tokyo Games, suffering a miscarriage and an ectopic pregnancy, but was able to celebrate at the Lee Valley VeloPark as she joined Josie Knight, Maddie Leech and Sophie Lewis to hold off Wales in the bronze medal ride.

They were significantly off the pace set by Australia and New Zealand, who took gold and silver respectively, but with Lewis, 20, and Leech, 19, riding in their first major competition and bigger targets to come at the Euros and worlds later this year, Kenny called bronze “brilliant”.

“I’ve never felt so much pressure to try to win a bronze medal in my whole career,” Kenny said. “The fact this is such a young team, I’ve been lucky in my career to have some brilliant experiences and step on the podium but this is the first taste of it for Maddie and Sophie.

“Going into that final, it could have been for gold at an Olympics I was that nervous…I didn’t think I was going to be here and if circumstances had been different I wouldn’t be, but to come here and play a part with these girls has been brilliant.”

Kenny’s son Albie was off visiting the London Transport Museum but this was still a family affair with husband Jason – now on the coaching staff – taking Kenny’s bike to the start line.

Jason then turned his attention to the men’s team sprint in which the England trio of Joe Truman, Ryan Owens and Hamish Turnbull took silver behind an Australian squad that set a new Games record with a time of 42.040 seconds.

England’s quartet of Charlie Tanfield, Dan Bigham, Ollie Wood and