With 30 of the 36 top-ranked male sprinters competing in Thursday’s men’s keirin competition at the UCI world championships in Santiago, Chile, the only certainty is that we can expect some thrilling racing.

There will be six heats in the first round, six riders in each, with the first and second placed riders proceeding to the quarter finals. But in each heat, you could make a strong case for at least three riders.

Heat one features current world champion Kento Yamasaki: with no riders ranked in the world top 10, it’s as good a heat as he could have hoped for. He faces Jeffrey Hoogland and Daniel Barber, both of whom raced yesterday into the latter stages of the team sprint.

World number one Harrie Lavreysen goes in heat two, and he looked in great form during Wednesday’s team sprint competition. It wouldn’t be a surprise to see Ota, Dakin or Nulens go through with him.

Heat 3 features Harry Ledingham-Horn, who rode in qualifying and the first round of yesterday’s team sprint, but was replaced in the final by Hamish Turnbull. He will need fresh and strong legs, as he lines up against world no2 Mateusz Rudyk, not to mention Nick Wammes, who didn’t race yesterday, and Tom Derache.

Kevin Quintero and Leigh Hoffman are the obvious picks in heat 4, but Luca Spiegel has been working hard in preparation. Ryan Dodyk put in a good opening lap for Canada in team sprint qualifying, but they failed to make the first round.

Heat five could be the best of the lot, with Matthew Richardson facing Shinji Nakano and Nicholas Paul. But don’t forget Maximilian Dörnbach, who banked several wins over the summer, adding to the silver medal he won at Europeans in February.

And finally, based on the rankings, Mikhail Yakovlev and Cristian Ortega are the men to beat in heat six, but you can’t discount riders like Stefano Moro or Sébastien Vigier; and Minato Nakaishi has been racking up wins in Japanese domestic keirin this year, albeit in lower-grade F1 races.

The first round begins at 11am local time: that’s 3pm UK, or 11pm Tokyo. First round repechages follow an hour later, with another hour before the quarter finals.

They get a few hours rest before the semi-finals at 6.14pm local time (10.14pm UK, 6.14am Tokyo). There will be a 7-12 final at 7.43pm local (11.43pm UK, 7.43am Tokyo), followed by the medal race.