British Keep Home Fires Burning

A home world championships in Olympic year will come with its own pitfalls for the Great Britain team. Expectations are high for the event which starts in Manchester today after last year's unprecedented haul of seven gold medals, while there has been a fear within the camp that due to the pressure of competing at home the team may have difficulty lifting their game for Beijing.

"This is the last major international event before the Olympics, it's in front of the home crowd, which is a huge positive, but there are challenges as well," said the performance director, Dave Brailsford. "We are normally in a hotel somewhere three-quarters of a mile from the velodrome in a foreign country, with nothing to distract us. The challenge is to be as focused as we would usually be. The weight of expectation is bigger than ever."

That is hardly surprising given last year's medal tally, which, looking purely at Olympic cycling disciplines within the world championships, would have put the team 17th in the overall Athens medal table with five golds, two silver and two bronze. Tonight there are three events where they will seek gold, starting with the men's 4,000m pursuit, where Bradley Wiggins defends his title and Rob Hayles will look to rekindle memories of a medal-winning ride in 2000 when the world event last visited Manchester.

While there is another chance of a medal in the women's 500m time-trial for Shanaze Reade, the men's team sprint has been a mainstay of the success on the track over the last decade, and the trio - selected from Jamie Staff, Jason Kenny, Chris Hoy, Matt Crampton and Ross Edgar - hope to avenge their narrow defeat to the French in 2007.