KATIE ARCHIBALD picked up her second medal of the Glasgow 2018 European Championships last night, but it was not the colour she wanted.

The 24-year-old was part of the GB quartet that took gold in the team pursuit on Friday evening and was favourite to take her second gold of the Games gold in last night’s individual pursuit final.

The Scot was up against Germany’s Lisa Brennauer. and the German is no slouch, although her best results have come on the road, having won individual team trial gold in 2014 and team time trial gold in 2013, 2014 and 2015.

Added to that, Archibald’s season has been disrupted by a broken collarbone, from which she has only recently recovered. But after the Scot qualified fastest for the gold medal ride after the morning session, the assumption was she was in good enough shape to successfully defend the title she won in both 2014 and 2016.

This was the race the Glasgow crowd had been waiting for and there was little between the two riders for the first few laps but as the 1000m mark approached, Brennauer began to ease ahead. The 30-year-old had opened a one second gap by the one kilometre mark, a lead she never relinquished with Archibald’s trademark strength not enough to overhaul the deficit.

It was an unusual sight to see an opponent of Archibald’s looking the more comfortable of the two riders in the closing stages of a race but the Scot conceded she was beaten by the better rider on the day, with Brennauer crossing the line in 3 minutes 26.879 seconds, almost three seconds ahead of Archibald.

“It’s better when you win but going into that, I needed her not to back up,” she said.

“I couldn’t have touched 3 minutes 26 there. I felt rough in the morning although I felt miles better in the afternoon but it’s still wasn’t really within touching distance.”

The Sir Chris Hoy Velodrome was packed out for last night’s session and gave Archibald vocal backing but she admitted she was aware that towards the end of the race, the cheers were ones encouraging her to continue fighting rather than pushing her towards victory.

“When we were racing in Australia at the Commonwealth Games, I could tell that I’d won the final because I was up against an Australian and it was the same noise as when I lost here,” she said.

“There was a lot of support but you can already tell you that people are cheering you to get home, not because you’ve won so that’s a bit of an odd noise to hear.”

Archibald’s fatigue was, at least in part, down to the lack of recovery time she had between picking up team pursuit gold on Friday and launching into qualifying for the individual pursuit yesterday morning, which totalled just over 12 hours.

But despite having intimated earlier ion the week that she may have withdrawn from the individual pursuit due to it no longer being an Olympic event, she had no regrets about competing, despite the fact she gave herself such a tough schedule. And the Scot suggested that perhaps Brennauer’s road pedigree equipped her better with the quick turnaround.

“100 percent, I’m glad I did this,” she said of the event.

“When I was worried about not doing it, I really thought I’d be rolling round in the mid-thirties, the way my training efforts have been going.

“I took a lot from the team pursuit stuff we’ve done and as I said, I felt not totally on it this morning and there’s just no way there’s a 26 in me. So I’m not disappointed to be behind that.

We’ve all got the same excuse - Lisa and Justyna (Kaczkowska from Poland, who won bronze), I’m pretty sure all three of us did all three team pursuit rounds so it maybe Lisa coped better with that. “Myself and Justyne, you don’t see our names in so many road results as Lisa.”

Archibald has a rest day today before she begins her assault on the omnium and madison titles tomorrow and on Tuesday and she is confident by then, she will have fully recovered.

“I’ve got a rest day tomorrow and I think a lot of the omnium riders will be doing the elimination race,” she said

“So I just need to stay activated but not fatigued and wake up with a spring in my step on Monday.”

However, there will still be an Archibald in action today with Katie’s older brother, John, going in the individual pursuit, in which he won Commonwealth silver in April. And the younger sibling admits she is delighted to see him compete in his first European Championships.

“I’m really happy (he’s here),” she said.

“He’s the only non-squad rider so his experience has been really different. I’ve asked him what I should be saying about him although I probably should have asked him how he is, but that didn’t occur to me. For him, it’s all to gain and nothing to lose so it should be a good day.”

Elsewhere, Ethan Hayter took gold for GB in the omnium.