Cooke on the Boil for Time Trial

For the gold medalist Nicole Cooke and her team-mate Emma Pooley, tomorrow's time trial began the moment after they crossed the line in the pouring rain amid the green hills outside Beijing. "We treated ourselves to a cappuccino in the cafe in the village," said Pooley, "and there was a bit of celebration but no jumping around, nothing that might damage our legs."

Both will have an outside chance of a medal in tomorrow morning's 15-mile race over a single lap of the finishing circuit used for Saturday and Sunday's road races, Pooley on the strength of eighth place in last year's world championship behind tomorrow's favorite Hanka Kupfernagel of Germany and Cooke on the basis of fifth place in the 2006 world's.

"I'm confident for both of them. Emma has been working hard and has said since the start of the year this would be her target, and it will be exciting to see them both," said the women's road manager, Julian Winn, while conceding that Cooke's victory in the road race could either prove a distraction or an inspiration.

"It's whether Nicole loses, not motivation, but a little bit of focus, she will have a busy 24 hours. It's not that she can't do a good time trial but she has just achieved an amazing thing which could be distracting. On the other hand, it could also have the effect of really firing her up. Form is as much about belief as it is about the legs; mental strength is the biggest muscle in the body."

After Sunday's race, Cooke played down her chances, on the grounds that her legs still hurt, while Pooley was more bullish. "When we looked at the circuit in December I thought it would be perfect for me, but when we reconnoitred it this week the climb didn't seem so hard. I'm hopeful," she said. While Cooke is a pure road racer who can time trial, Pooley is a triathlete who came to road racing late in comparison and admits she still finds the instinctive bike-handling reflexes called upon in road racing hard to master.