If Jennie Reed couldn't quite believe her world title, then neither could the home crowd at the Manchester velodrome.

Reed's jubilant gold medal in the women's keirin, the climactic event in five days of racing, was greeted with stunned silence by the British fans who had become drunk on the success that Team GB had claimed in the 2008 World Track Championships.

"This is the first world championship of my career and I have got a gold medal so I am just elated," Reed said, as she came off the track.

A few yards away, outgoing world champion, Great Britain's Vicky Pendleton, a former training partner of the American's, was struggling to fight back tears of disappointment.

Pendleton's sprinting had looked so assured that, nine golds in the bag; each and every Brit’ had banked on the show ending with a perfect ten. No one had reckoned on Reed doing exactly what she had predicted earlier in the week; saving her best for last, just as Pendleton looked to be a spent force.

"Vicky's always good, she's always strong," a beaming Reed said afterwards, "but I know for the keirin my tactic is usually pretty good. The only thing was that I had to tell myself to attack her and that when I decided to go, it had to be full. But yeah, I was surprised to come around her."

"I'm a bit shocked," Reed said. "When she took the lead I thought, 'oh this is going to be hard,' but all of a sudden I was closing faster than I thought. I was just giving it everything. I didn't realize I was in first position until I crossed the line.

"I don't think Vicky went too early, but when she got out of the saddle on the back straight I was a little bit surprised. But luckily she didn't have too much speed left."

Reed will now travel to Beijing as one of the favorites for sprint gold.

"Now I am in my late 20's, almost 30, and I feel stronger than ever,” Reed said. “I think I am enjoying racing more than ever too and that helps a lot."

"I always feel bad on the day of the keirin, but my legs must be okay, I guess, even though they're a little bit tired. But I think that makes me more relaxed. So, I go into the racing more relaxed and that usually turns out for the best."

A six a.m. flight home from Manchester, on Monday, will be followed by a short break and then the build-up to the Olympic Games.

"I'll go home and have a couple of week’s vacation, spend some time with my family and then start preparing for Beijing," she said.

Pendleton meanwhile, will no doubt be working hard to rebuild her dented confidence after a disappointing end to a golden week.

Brailsford shaken by ‘Hayles crisis’
Team GB coach, David Brailsford, one of the key figures in the success of the Great Britain track team in recent years, admitted Sunday night that he had considered quitting on the first day of these world championships, after British rider Rob Hayles failed a UCI hematocrit test.

Hayles' elevated hematocrit has caused something of a crisis in British cycling.

Photo: Agence France Presse (File Photo)

As is usual, Hayles was immediately withdrawn from racing and suspended for 14 days, but Brailsford, a driving force behind Team GB's anti-doping stance, was left to defend both Hayles and the internal screening procedures within his squad.

"I was going to quit," Brailsford said. "For 24 hours I'd questioned my job. I didn't want to be in a situation where, out of the blue, everything I'd worked for had just gone in a flash on the basis of what someone else might, or might not, have done."

"I had a real wobble. That's when it really hit me. I thought, 'I'll go and sell cars, do something where I'm responsible for my own actions.' I had half-an-hour on my own and it was the worst period I've had in this job."

Brailsford is now working hard to ensure that a “Hayles Crisis” does not materialize again by collaborating with UK Sport's soon to be established anti-doping agency. According to the Team GB head coach, Hayles' result test was only one of several examples of high hematocrit within the squad, attributed to variations in blood values, during the “taper” period from intense training into competition.

"We do not have a systematic doping program," he said last week. "Anybody is welcome to come and see us, be with us, live with us, 24/7 and they will soon figure it out for themselves. I am as sure as sure can be that there isn't an issue with Rob. It's unfortunate, but I think we will get to the bottom of it."