Sporting Digest: Cycling

WORLD TRACK CHAMPIONSHIPS (Palermo): Men's 4,000m team pursuit, qualifying round (first eight to quarter-finals): 1 Australia 4min 12.916sec; 2 Germany 4:15.398; 3 United States 4:15.679; 4 Denmark 4:17.185; 5 France 4:18.887; 6 Italy 4:20.379; 7 Netherlands 4:21.447; 8 Russia 4:22.009. Quarter- finals: France 4:12.946 bt Denmark 4:14.127; United States 4:15.509 bt Italy 4:18.447; Germany 4:12.532 bt Netherlands 4:18.536; Australia 4:11.770 bt Russia 4:18.378. Men's sprint, semi-finals (best-of-three matches): D Hill (Aus) bt J Fiedler (Ger) 2-1; M Nothstein (US) bt M Huebner (Ger) 2-1. Final: Nothstein bt Hill 2-0. Bronze medal: Huebner bt Fiedler 2-0. Women's 3,000m pursuit, semi-finals: S Samohvalova (Rus) 3:50.026 bt J Eickhoff (US) 3:52.531; M Clignet (Fr) 3:46.686 bt A Belluti (It) 3:54.107. Final: Clignet 3:43.399 bt Samohvalova 3:50.898. Women's sprint, quarter-finals (best-of-three): L Tyler (Aus) bt Yan Wang (Ch) 2-0; F Ballanger (Fr) bt E Salumae (Est) 2-0; O Grishina (Rus) bt T Dubnicoff (Can) 2-0; G Enukhina (Rus) bt I Haringa (Neth) 2-1.

TOUR OF NETHERLANDS (Haaksbergen) Fourth stage, 30.8km time trial: 1 D Bottaro (It) 37min 45sec; 2 S Knaven (Neth) 15sec behind; 3 V Ekimov (Rus) +17; 4 D Abdoujaparov (Uzb) +18; 5 B Riis (Den) +20; 6 S Yates (GB) +21; 7 E Breukink (Neth) +22; 8 R Fina (It) +34; 9 D Cordes (Neth) same time; 10 B Voskamp (Neth) +46. Overall: 1 Abdoujaparov 11hr 32min 18sec; 2 Bottaro same time; 3 Knaven +13sec; 4 Ekimov +17; 5 Riis +20; 6 Yates +21; 7 Breukink +22; 8 Cordes +34; 9 L Scinto (It) +42; 10 Voskamp +46.