Great Britain sprinter Matthew Richardson has become the first man to go under 9 seconds for a flying 200 metre effort, in a specially arranged record attempt in Turkey.
Richardson returned to the high-altitude Konya velodrome where he had previously gone faster than Harrie Lavreysen‘s Paris Olympics world record of 9.088 – only to see his effort ruled out as a record for having clearly ridden on the safety zone on the inside of the track.
Richardson – riding a silver and black Hope HB.T bike with front and rear discs, Princeton and Campagnolo respectively, plus 3D-printed components from Renishaw – posted a time of 8.941 seconds. This gave him an average speed for the effort of 80.527 kilometres per hour, a fraction over 50 miles per hour.
He was remarkably consistent across today’s effort, with a split for the first 100m of 4.471 – and a time for the second half of 4.470.
Having switched sporting allegiance from Australia to Great Britain following last summer’s Olympics, Richardson is in the remarkable position of holding two continental records, Europe and Oceania, as well as two national records.
‘Me vs me’
But just a couple of hours afterwards, Richardson revealed he plans to come back 24 hours later, to do it all again. ‘you thought I was done?? Noooooooooo sir,’ he wrote on Instagram. ‘Tomorrow I will try and break my own wr. Me vs me. Let’s have it.’
Speaking after his effort on Thursday, Richardson had said: ‘I rode of lot of it outside the sprint lane, so I know there’s a bit more there.’
A successful second attempt would match the feat of France’s Kévin Sireau, who set two records in two days at Moscow’s 333m track in May 2009
Earlier in the day, British para-cyclist Will Bjergfelt had set a new world hour record in the C5 class. The 46 year old’s distance of 51.471km smashed a record which had stood for over a decade.
‘There’s been so much hard work put in by so many people,’ he wrote afterwards on Instagram. ‘I’m proud of everyone including myself for delivering.’
But Charlie Tanfield came up short in his ambitious attempt to beat Filippo Ganna‘s overall hour best, recording a valiant 53.967km – which puts him below countrymen Bradley Wiggins, Alex Dowsett and Dan Bigham in the history book.
Men’s flying 200 records (open era)
| Date | Rider | Country | Time | Track |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 06.08.1990 | Vladimir Adamachvili | URS | 10.099 | Moscow |
| 28.09.1995 | Curt Harnett | CAN | 9.865 | Bogota (outdoor) |
| 16.12.2006 | Theo Bos | NED | 9.772 | Moscow |
| 29.05.2009 | Kévin Sireau | FRA | 9.650 | Moscow |
| 30.05.2009 | Kévin Sireau | FRA | 9.572 | Moscow |
| 06.12.2013 | François Pervis | FRA | 9.347 | Aguascalientes |
| 04.09.2019 | Nicholas Paul | TTO | 9.100 | Cochabamba |
| 07.08.2024 | Harrie Lavreysen | NED | 9.088 | Paris |
| 14.08.2025 | Matthew Richardson | GBR | 8.941 | Konya |
Note: UCI rules state that ‘a record beaten the same day shall not be confirmed’ – so Richardson’s 9.091 at the Paris Olympics, a few minutes before Lavreysen’s 9.088, did not make the official list.