Olympics won't distract Cavendish from World Championships

Cavendish returned to the track in 2015 and has been splitting his time there with his road racing for Dimension Data, and will make his first World Championship appearance since 2008 in London next week.

British cyclist Mark Cavendish will partner Bradley Wiggins in the madison as he goes in search of a third world track title.

The 2016 Olympic Games may only be six months away but Mark Cavendish insists he is only focused on performing at the UCI Track World Championships.

Cavendish returned to the track in 2015 and has been splitting his time there with his road racing for Dimension Data, and will make his first World Championship appearance since 2008 in London next week.

He will partner Bradley Wiggins in the madison as he goes in search of a third world track title, the pair hoping to impress Team GB technical director Shane Sutton and earn a place in Rio.

However, the prospect of the featuring in a third Olympics is far from Cavendish's mind.

"I am just thinking about what's ahead. The next thing," he told Omnisport. "I've just come back, won the Tour of Qatar, came back; my thoughts are straight on the world championships. 

"And then two days after the world championships, two days after we ride the madison, I am in Italy ready to start Tirreno-Adriatico on the road so for me I am just thinking about that. 

"If I start thinking about the Tour [de France] now it takes away from the track. If I start thinking about Rio it takes away from the Tour, if I start thinking about both of them it takes away from the sprint classics and the world championships during the next week, so it's just really trying to balance everything between the track and the road."

His madison partner Wiggins agrees their focus should only be on the worlds, but concedes the event in London will be their proving ground for a potential Rio challenge.

"We're not going to do another race like this between now and the Olympics, and it's an opportunity to go through everything in the weeks before that you're going to do. 

"The Worlds are important but it's not the Olympics so, we'll asses after, what worked, what didn't work, what we should have done differently so it's a final dress rehearsal for the Olympics and you want to get it right.

"[But] I haven't really thought about it [Rio 2016] at the moment other than trying to do the standards to make the team to start with. 

"No one has booked a place already, everyone's [been] working day in, day out with the people here just to improve and when they make the selections for the Olympics you hope you'll be in there and you've done enough but I don't think anyone thinks they're on that plane at the moment.

"Obviously everyone [is] excited at the prospect of going at the moment … [but] it's all been about the world championship."