As Gillian Carleton returned to the Victoria airport last August with her bronze medal from the 2012 London Summer Olympics, she was asked by a five-year-old fan if it would be gold next time.
鈥淚鈥檒l do my best,鈥� said Carleton, chuckling at the kind of direct question that can only come from kids.
That long road to Rio 2016 begins this week at the UCI world track cycling championships, which open today in Minsk, Belarus.
Few expected Carleton 鈥� mostly off the radar in 2011 but who experienced one of the most rapid ascents ever for an Island athlete 鈥� to be standing on the podium at the 2012 London Olympics.
But now the 21-year-old Victoria cyclist won鈥檛 be sneaking up on anybody. It was only seven months ago that Carleton, among 48 Island athletes in the 2012 Summer Olympics, emerged as a medallist along with Victoria swimmers Ryan Cochrane and Richard Weinberger and the Elk Lake-based men鈥檚 rowing eight.
Yet, the only constant in international sport is change, with adaptability a major asset. Carleton will step up to the leadership role this year on the women鈥檚 Canadian track team following the post-London retirement of veteran Tara Whitten of Edmonton.
Two-thirds of sa国际传媒鈥檚 London Olympic bronze-medallist women鈥檚 pursuit team 鈥� Carleton and German-born new-Canadian Jasmin Glaesser of Coquitlam 鈥� return. But the team from London is now minus its former lead engine Whitten, who is replaced by Laura Brown of Vancouver.
Not that it seems to have slowed sa国际传媒鈥檚 pursuit prowess as Carleton, Glaesser and Brown teamed to win gold at the recent UCI World Cup in Mexico.
鈥淥ur preparation for these world championships has been much more relaxed following the Olympics, with the team only getting together in January for its first World Cup,鈥� said Carleton, in a statement.
鈥淗owever, with the additional rest and time spent at home, our recent blocks of hard training have been very productive and positive. We hope to harness those good feelings in the team pursuit [which is scheduled for Thursday.]鈥�
Carleton will also step into sa国际传媒鈥檚 role in the omnium, a single-rider multi-event discipline in which Whitten was ranked No. 1 in the world for several years before disappointingly just missing the Olympic podium at London.
Carleton looks to be a double threat, which is quite a thing for a former road rider who only took to the track at the then just-reopened Juan de Fuca Velodrome in the summer of 2011 for mental and physical rehabilitation because she was still wary of the road after being involved in a car accident in the spring of 2011.
The St. Margaret鈥檚 grad is already making an impact in the omnium, placing fourth at the recent World Cup in Mexico.
鈥淚 am really excited to do another omnium against the best in the world and gain valuable experience for next year, when I hope to be competitive for a medal position,鈥� added Carleton, in her statement.
