British Cycling in good place after massive changes, says Shane Sutton
By Matt Westby
Last Updated: 14/10/15 11:15am
Shane Sutton believes the "massive changes" British Cycling made in the wake of their poor performance at this year’s World Championships have put them back in a "good place" ahead of the new track cycling season.
Britain slumped to a 14-year low when they won just three silver medals at the 2015 worlds in Paris in February.
Sutton, who is British Cycling's performance director, responded by restructuring the backroom set-up and empowering coaches to introduce innovative new training techniques.
He will get his first chance to see if the changes have had the desired effect at the European Track Championships in Switzerland, which are the first of just five major international meetings left before next summer's Olympic Games in Rio and start on Wednesday.
Sutton told skysports.com: "Paris, for a lot of riders, wasn't a great experience, but we have come back, dusted ourselves down and made massive changes, and now is time to see whether those changes are getting us little marginal gains here and there.
"The world has moved on and the dynamic has changed, so we needed to be a bit more innovative in the training, and the coaches have done that. They have brought different elements to their training that they didn't have before, because they know that the goalposts have moved.
"The whole thing has evolved over the past 18 months and we have made a lot of changes, and I believe we are in a good place now."
Among the new arrivals in the backroom staff are renowned endurance coach Heiko Salzwedel, sprint coach Justin Grace and sports scientist Calvin Morriss.
Although coaches and riders are reluctant to go into detail about the specifics of their new training regime, one example of innovation is the plastic bracelets the women's endurance riders are wearing in order monitor their sleep and maximise rest and recovery.
Many of Britain's riders are seasoned Olympic champions who have known nothing but the methods introduced by former performance director Sir Dave Brailsford, but Sutton says they have embraced this summer's transformation with enthusiasm.
He added: "The coaches have driven it and the athletes have bought into it because they can see the gain. In turn, when everyone is performing well and happy, it creates a really good environment and creates a winning mentality, and once you have got that, you are halfway there. I believe the training techniques they have put in place have worked a treat."
The European Track Championships take place in Grenchen from Wednesday, September 14, to Sunday, September 18.
