Tokyo Olympics: Gold on the track for cycling star Matt Walls
The 23-year-old rode smartly throughout the four-discipline event to win with a comfortable final margin of 24 points from Campbell Stewart of New Zealand.
Oldham-born Walls, who won the opening scratch race, went into the deciding points race with a narrow advantage of just six points but gained a lap on the field early on to take control, and could then mark his rivals for the remainder of the 100-lap event.
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Hide AdThe omnium has changed format for these Games, with four events now squeezed into one testing afternoon of racing.
Walls, the European champion who tested positive for Covid-19 in March, jointly led alongside Jan Willem Van Schip and Benjamin Thomas after the tempo race, but then outlasted the pair in the elimination race to take a narrow advantage into the decider.
He wasted little time in taking control as he gained a lap alongside American Gavin Hoover, winning the second sprint in the process.
That gave him a cushion of 30 points over the field, and from then on he could mark the likes of reigning champion Elia Viviani, Thomas and Stewart to the finish.
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Hide AdWalls told the BBC: “I managed to get a good lead coming to the end. It’s been a hard day. I came into that points race with a bit of a lead which was nice, it gave me a bit of breathing room.
“Thank you to all my family and friends, I wouldn’t be here without them. Especially my parents when I was younger growing up, they travelled around the country with me and there’s no chance I’d be here without them.”
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