Charlie Tanfield falls short in tilt at Filippo Ganna's Hour Record

Charlie Tanfield has fallen short in his ambitious attempt at breaking Filippo Ganna’s UCI World Hour Record. The Briton managed 53.967km, almost 3km down on Ganna’s 2022 mark of 56.762km.

Tanfield’s attempt took place on the Konya velodrome in Turkey, and the 28-year-old planned for a negative split in his attempt, with an eye to accelerating in the final 20 minutes of his effort.

Ganna’s record, however, was never put under any threat, and the Briton ultimately had to settle for the seventh best Hour Record attempt of all-time.

Tanfield has been a key member of the Great Britain track set-up in recent years, and he began preparing for the Hour Record tilt shortly after claiming a silver medal in the team pursuit at the Paris 2024 Olympics.

He was previously a team pursuit world champion with Great Britain in Apeldoorn in 2018 and he was part of the quartet that claimed the European title on the same track last year.

Ganna’s record of 56.792km was set in Grenchen, Switzerland in October 2022. The Italian not only beat the previous record of 55.548km set by Dan Bigham two months earlier, he also surpassed Chris Boardman’s absolute 1996 mark of 56.375km, which was set using the since-outlawed ‘Superman’ position.

World and Olympic time trial champion Remco Evenepoel has indicated that he will attempt the Hour Record in the future, while former record holder Eddy Merckx has called on Tadej Pogacar to make a tilt at the milestone.

Tanfield was not the only Briton to attempt a record in Konya on Thursday. Earlier in the day, his compatriot Will Bjergfelt set a new C5 UCI Hour Record of 51.471km, becoming the first para-cyclist to surpass 50km.