{"id":834306,"date":"2026-07-30T21:55:18","date_gmt":"2026-07-30T21:55:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/834306\/"},"modified":"2026-07-30T21:55:18","modified_gmt":"2026-07-30T21:55:18","slug":"commonwealth-games-new-look-squad-steps-up-to-win-team-sprint-gold","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/834306\/","title":{"rendered":"Commonwealth Games: New-look squad steps up to win Team Sprint gold"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The next generation of Australian sprinters have shone in Glasgow today, winning gold in the Men\u2019s Team Sprint at the 2026 Commonwealth Games early this morning.<\/p>\n<p>After the departure of Matthew Glaetzer (to <a href=\"https:\/\/australiancyclingteam.com\/news\/matthew-glaetzer-calls-time-on-illustrious-track-cycling-career\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">retirement<\/a>), Matthew Richardson (to England) and <a href=\"https:\/\/auscycling.org.au\/athletes\/thomas-cornish\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Tom Cornish<\/a> (to Australia\u2019s endurance squad), only <a href=\"https:\/\/auscycling.org.au\/athletes\/leigh-hoffman\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Leigh Hoffman<\/a> remained from the teams that won Commonwealth gold in Birmingham and Olympic bronze in Paris.<\/p>\n<p>Hoffman (26), from South Australia, was joined by Queensland\u2019s Ryan Elliott (22) and Dubbo\u2019s Danny Barber (23) to form a youthful team sprint squad eager to prove their abilities.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Australian Cycling Team's Ryan Elliott, Danny Barber and Leigh Hoffman racing the Men\u2019s Team Sprint at the 2026 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow, Scotland.\" height=\"1600\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/ts OHL_3203.jpg\" width=\"2400\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Elliott leads Hoffman and Barber in qualifying.<\/p>\n<p>Of course, this was not the trio\u2019s first outing on a big stage: they won <a href=\"https:\/\/australiancyclingteam.com\/news\/team-sprint-men-win-track-worlds-bronze-in-santiago\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">bronze at last year\u2019s World Championships<\/a>. However, as the pre-race favourites in Glasgow, this was a chance to prove themselves again.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere was a big change in roster after Paris,\u201d Elliott told journalists after the race. \u201cAnd everyone&#8217;s question then is, \u2018How well can the system back up? What&#8217;s their depth?<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAnd certainly us as the younger guys kind of come through and we wanted to prove that we have depth in Australia\u2019, and we\u2019re here, and were hungry.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<p>With Elliott as the starter, Hoffman in position two, and Barber bringing home the final lap, Australia qualified fastest in 42.754 \u2013 but only four-hundredths of a second ahead of England.<\/p>\n<p>It came down to the gold medal final, where the trio improved to 42.455 and a comfortable victory over England by over half a second.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Australian Cycling Team's Danny Barber celebrates after winning the Men\u2019s Team Sprint at the 2026 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow, Scotland.\" height=\"1600\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/barber OHL_5195 small.jpg\" width=\"2400\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Danny Barber celebrates the victory.<\/p>\n<p>Barber was satisfied with how the team picked up the pace between the two rounds.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cComing from the qualifying, where we kind of knew there was a bit to find \u2013 find in myself at least \u2013 to kind of execute that in that second round, it was pretty pleasing.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cTo look up at the scoreboard, knowing that I contributed to these boys and how well they set me up to be able to execute for them. It was a good feeling.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Today\u2019s result means Australia \u2013 and Hoffman \u2013 successfully defends the gold medal won at Birmingham 2022.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Australian Cycling Team's Ryan Elliott, Danny Barber and Leigh Hoffman sing the Australian national anthem with gold medals after winning the Men\u2019s Team Sprint at the 2026 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow, Scotland.\" height=\"1600\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/AW5_6342.jpg\" width=\"2400\"\/><\/p>\n<p>(Left to right) Hoffman, Elliott and Barber secured the top step in Glasgow.<\/p>\n<p>Attention for the squad now turns to the individual sprint and keirin events, where, despite the absence of teammate-turned-rival Matthew Richardson due to injury, the Aussies are wary of the talent in the field.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI would have loved for him [Richardson] to come here and race and see how we stack up, and Danny as well, racing sprint, how we stack up against him,\u201d Hoffman said. I&#8217;m upset he&#8217;s not here, but that&#8217;s what it is.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAnd I think there&#8217;s still some dangerous hitters out here like Azizul Awang, he&#8217;s won both keirins [in the UCI World Cup this year]. Nicholas Paul as well; the Commonwealth countries in track cycling are very strong. So, I&#8217;ve got plenty of other fish to worry about.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In other results, Australia finished fourth in the women\u2019s team sprint with Molly McGill, <a href=\"https:\/\/auscycling.org.au\/athletes\/kristina-clonan\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Kristina Clonan<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/auscycling.org.au\/athletes\/alessia-mcaig\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Alessia McCaig<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Photos: SWpix.com<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The next generation of Australian sprinters have shone in Glasgow today, winning gold in the Men\u2019s Team Sprint&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":834307,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[64,63,44],"class_list":["post-834306","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/834306","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=834306"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/834306\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/834307"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=834306"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=834306"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=834306"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}