Cycling: Wiggins Aim to Pursue Gold in 2012

Britain's triple medallist in Athens Bradley Wiggins has set himself the target of becoming the first cyclist to take gold in the individual pursuit in three successive Olympics.

"I'm looking for three pursuit titles on the trot, I will defend the title in Beijing, then I'll aim for London in 2012 if they get the games," said the Londoner, who took individual pursuit gold, silver in the team pursuit and bronze in the madison in Greece.

Wiggins will devote 2005 to road racing, although as yet he is uncertain about his goals. "The prologue time-trial of the Tour de France is the most natural thing to look at, but it may not happen next year, perhaps the year after or in 2007 if London gets the start."

Together with Britain's other two-wheeled medallists from Athens, Wiggins topped the bill on Saturday evening at the Revolution 5 track meeting at the Manchester Velodrome, which gave home fans a rare chance to celebrate British cycling's most successful Olympics.

To a background of Kraftwerk's Tour de France and a backdrop of Olympic action on a giant television screen, Wiggins was presented to a sell-out crowd together with the kilometre gold medallist Chris Hoy and the team pursuit silver medallists Rob Hayles, Chris Newton, Paul Manning and Bryan Steel, who has now retired.

The husband and wife team of Ellen and Paul Hunter, who medalled with Ian Sharpe and Aileen McGlynn in the Paralympics, were also applauded by the 3,500-strong crowd. Only the team pursuit silver medallist Steve Cummings was absent, on national team duty in Australia.

Resplendent in a specially made white jersey featuring the Olympic rings - which was auctioned later in aid of a local hospital - Wiggins set the tone for the evening by winning the opening event, a "devil take the hindmost", where the last rider across the line each lap is eliminated. Symbolically, he was led out by Hayles, with whom he took a bronze medal in the Madison relay.

The variety of events included a four-man individual pursuit won by Newton from Wiggins and an individual sprint series, which culminated with Hoy taking on Craig Maclean in the final, where the duo delighted the crowd with a stand-still lasting 45sec before Hoy won from behind.

"I can't believe it was 10 years ago that I first came here, to the opening meeting, a fresh-faced junior riding the team sprint for Scotland," said Hoy. "It's weird looking back 10 years, we didn't really have much to shout about back then apart from Chris Boardman, and it's been totally transformed since then."

Hoy will ride the sprint events in the Grenoble Six-day next week, and will be looking for a strong ride in the track world cup at Manchester from January 7-9.

"It's nice to see an event progress and this has moved forwards since last year, they've invested in a sound system and lighting and so on," said British cycling's perfor mance director Dave Brailsford, who is talking to three potential major sponsors on the back of his cyclists' performances in Athens.

"What gives me the greatest pleasure is to see the young riders," said Brailsford, referring to the "Future Champions" events featuring under-19s. "It's great for them to have something to aim for, and for them to rub shoulders with the Olympic champions.

"It's also great to have something where you can turn your head and see the great and the good of British cycling like Chris Boardman standing next to someone like Wiggins or Hoy."