Cycling: Pendleton and Varnish set up Australia duel Great Britain's women added a second showdown for gold with Australia to the men's team pursuit in London's World Cup yesterday, after the team sprint duo of Vicky Pendleton and Jess Varnish roared home in second place here behind the Aussies in the qualifying round. The women's sprint finals promise to be as much of a humdinger as the men's pursuit battle for gold against Australia on Sunday, too. The Australian pair of Anna Meares and Kaarle McCulloch have already set a world record time, of 32.828sec here yesterday, on their way to the top of the scoreboard - the first world record for London's Olympic velodrome, which is quickly establishing a reputation as being super-fast. "This is the best possible outcome we could be having: an Australia-British final," Meares said, "it's the closest we will get to the Olympic Games." However, Varnish and Pendleton earned backslaps from their back-up staff, too, by breaking the GB record, with a time 32.966sec en route to second place. As if that were not enough of an expectation-raiser, Pendleton's lap was the fastest of all the qualifiers as well, by more than a tenth of a second. The men's sprint was a shade more predictable, as the world champions and world record holders Germany all but fulfilled their status as favourites by finishing less than half a second slower than the leaders France. Britain, meanwhile, are still searching for their ideal first man of their sprint trio - Jamie Staff having retired after taking gold in the 2008 Olympics ahead of Jason Kenny and Sir Chris Hoy - and will take on Australia for bronze. Great Britain have therefore racked up a total of three out of four duels for gold so far, starting with the women's team pursuit - where Dani King replaces Wendy Houvenhagel in the line-up - against Canada and the team sprint against Australia later yesterday. As Meares says, the relevance of such battles, given that there are so few opportunities for direct racing against Olympic rivals (only the World Championships in March remains after this), should not be underestimated. The World Cup here is your first big stopcheck. It's like an audit of where you're at," Chris Boardman, the Olympic individual pursuit gold medallist in Barcelona 1992, told The Independent. It's the first opportunity in the Olympic year to measure yourself and the yardstick you're using is the best in the world. The Australians are doing very well, but, to be honest, the GB team is doing better than I expected at this point. However, as Boardman points out, this is the time when mistakes can, still, be made without too high a price being paid, "and in that sense it's a fantastic dress rehearsal for August." Indeed, with three medals now definitely within Britain's reach, as well as a fourth possible in the men's sprint, so far the World Cup could hardly have gone better.