Cycling at the 1954 British Empire and Commonwealth Games

Cycling at the 1954 British Empire and Commonwealth Games
Venue	Empire Oval, China Creek Park, Vancouver
Dates	30 July – 7 August 1954
←  1950 1958  →

Cycling at the 1954 British Empire and Commonwealth Games was the fourth appearance of Cycling at the Commonwealth Games. The events were held in Vancouver, Canada from 30 July to 7 August 1954. ^[1]

The track events took place at Empire Oval or Broadway Bowl in China Creek Park, ^[2] which had been specially constructed wooden track for the Games. ^{[3] [4]}

The road race course was described as quite flat, featuring a high point of 360 feet and the highest gradient was 250 feet in 440 yards. ^[5]

England topped the cycling medal table with three gold medals. ^{[6] [7]}

In the sprint final, Lionel Cox of Australia did not receive a medal after refusing to continue the match against Cyril Peacock of England. Cox had been disqualfied in race 1 for cutting across Peacock's wheel and subsequently the Australian team refused to participate in the next race and were subsequently disqualified. ^{[8] [9]}

Broadway Bowl track cycling during the games.
Attribution:Province newspaper

Medal table

  *   Host nation (Canada)

Medals won by nation with totals, ranked by number of golds—sortable

Rank	Nation	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
1	England  (ENG)	3	2	2	7
2	Australia  (AUS)	2	0	0	2
3	South Africa	1	0	2	3
4	New Zealand  (NZL)	0	1	0	1
5	Wales	0	0	1	1
6	Canada *	0	0	0	0
	Guiana  (BGU)	0	0	0	0
	Pakistan  (PAK)	0	0	0	0
	Scotland  (SCO)	0	0	0	0
	Southern Rhodesia  (SRH)	0	0	0	0
Totals (10 entries)		6	3	5	14

Medal winners

Event	Gold	Silver	Bronze
Time trial	Dick Ploog  (AUS)		Keith Harrison  (ENG)
	Alfred Swift  (SAF)
Sprint	Cyril Peacock  (ENG)	+not awarded	Tom Shardelow  (SAF)
Individual pursuit	Norman Sheil  (ENG)	Peter Brotherton  (ENG)	Robert Fowler  (SAF)
10 Miles scratch	Lindsay Cocks  (AUS)	Keith Harrison  (ENG)	Don Skene  (WAL)
Road race	Eric Thompson  (ENG)	John Baird  (NZL)	Bernard Pusey  (ENG)

Results

1 km time trial

Pat Murphy of Canada.
Attribution:Province newspaper

Rank	Rider	Time
	Dick Ploog	1:12.5
	Alfred Swift	1:12.5
	Keith Harrison	1:12.7
4	Peter Brotherton	1:12.8
5	Cyril Peacock	1:13.0
6	Colin Dickinson	1:13.2
7	Ron Robertson	1:13.7
8	Lindsay Cocks	1:13.8
9	Jim Davies	1:14.1
10	Patrick Murphy	1:14.5
11	Lionel Cox	1:14.6
12	Neil Ritchie	1:15.3
13	John van Wyk	1:15.7
14	André Robert	1:15.8
15	Ernest Branfield	1:15.9
16	Les Lock	1:16.1
17	Don Skene	1:16.2
18	Malcolm Campbell	1:20.0
19	Muhammad Naqi Mallick	1:22.0
20	Ghulam H. Baloch	1:23.9
21	Philip R. Waring	1:23.9
22	Mahmood Saleem Farooqi	1:26.9

1,000m sprint championship

Quarter-final

Athlete	Athlete	Score
Tom Shardelow	Jim Davies	2–0
Lionel Cox	Colin Dickinson	2–0
Cyril Peacock	Alfred Swift	2–1
Dick Ploog	Keith Harrison	2–1

Semi finals

• Peacock bt Plog 2–0
• Cox bt Shardelow 2–

Third place

• Shardelow bt Ploog 2–1

Final

• Peacock bt Cox w/o

4,000 metres individual purusit

^[10] Qualifiers for quarter-finals

Athlete	Time
Norman Sheil	5.10.4
Robert Fowler	5.10.8
Ron Mitton	5.12.2
Peter Brotherton	5.13.2
Bernard Pusey	5.16.7
Neil Ritchie	5.21.4
Patrick Murphy	5.21.5
John William Law	5.22.8

Quarter-finals

• Sheil bt Law - caught at 4.44.4
• Brotherton bt Ritchie - 5.12.3
• Fowler bt Murphy - 5.13.4
• Pusey bt Mitton - 5.09.5

Semi-finals

• Sheil bt Fowler - 5.06.4
• Brotherton bt Pusey 5.14.6

Third place

• Fowler 5.06.9 bt Pusey 5.08.5

Final

• Sheil 5.03.5 (world record) bt Brotherton 5.09.1

10 mile scratch race

Scratch race in progress.
Attribution:Province newspaper

Pos	Athlete	Time
1	Lindsay Cocks	2.44.08
2	Keith Harrison
3	Don Skene
4	Lorne Atkinson
5	Les Lock
6	Eric Thompson
-	Dick Ploog
-	B. Henderson
-	Fred Markus
-	Norman Sheil
-	Colin Dickinson
-	Neil Ritchie
-	Mahmood Saleem Farooqi
-	Muhammad Naqi Mallick
-	Ghulam H. Baloch
-	Ronnie Parks
-	John Alfred Swift
-	Tom Shardelow
-	Ron Robertson
-	Malcolm Campbell
-	Philip R. Waring
-	Ernest P. Branfield
-	John van Wyk

Road Race

1954 British Empire and Commonwealth Games road race
Attribution:Province newspaper

Pos	Athlete	Time
1	Eric Thompson	2.44.08
2	John Baird
3	Bernard Pusey
4	Edward James Nestor
5	George Frederick Nevin
6	Ronnie Parks
7	Alfred Swift
-	John O'Sullivan
-	John William Law
-	André Robert
-	Patrick Murphy
-	Guy Morin
-	A. Cole
-	Norman Sheil
-	Tony Hoar
-	M. Crum-Ewing
-	Les Lock
-	Neil Ritchie
-	Lance Payne
-	Mahmood Saleem Farooqi
-	Muhammad Naqi Mallick
-	Ghulam H. Baloch
-	Ron Robertson
-	Robert Fowler
-	Malcolm Campbell
-	Don Skene
-	Philip R. Waring
-	Ernest P. Branfield

See also

• List of Commonwealth Games medallists in cycling

References

1. "Results for the 1954 British Empire & Commonwealth Games". TheCGF.com. Commonwealth Games Federation. Archived from the original on 14 September 2012. Retrieved 9 December 2016.
2. "The Mega-event that Set a Pace for Vancouver". The Tyee. 31 July 2014. Retrieved 24 September 2025.
3. "Tuesday at the BEG". Vancouver Sun. 2 August 1954. p. 12. Retrieved 22 September 2025– via Google Newspapers.
4. "Growing Interest in Empire Games" . Birmingham Daily Post. 7 June 1954. Retrieved 22 September 2025– via British Newspaper Archive.
5. "Empire Games Details" . Western Mail. 14 April 1954. Retrieved 22 September 2025– via British Newspaper Archive.
6. "Medal Standings Vancouver 1954". Commonwealth Games Federation. Retrieved 22 September 2025.
7. "Commonwealth Games Medallists - Cycling". GBR Athletics. Retrieved 22 September 2025.
8. "Aussies Boycott Games Cycling". Daily Advertiser (Wagga Wagga, NSW). 5 August 1954. p. 1.
9. "Straight Wins" . Daily Mirror. 5 August 1954. Retrieved 23 September 2025– via British Newspaper Archive.
10. "Sheil heads cycle qualifiers" . Daily Express. 3 August 1954. Retrieved 23 September 2025– via British Newspaper Archive.