Alex Porter fell in the men's team pursuit at the Tokyo Olympics after his handlebar broke in the qualifying round. Fortunately, Porter was in the back of the team when he fell and did not involve his teammates, but the fall was not the fault of the athlete, but of a malfunctioning piece of equipment.

The remaining three riders on the team immediately called for a restart, which they technically should have done during the lap in which the incident occurred. It is unclear if Porter will ride in Australia's second attempt, but he was able to get up quickly after the accident; in his second attempt, the Australian raced up to fifth place with a time of 3:48.448.

"I think the sport is entertainment," he said.

"Obviously there was a mechanical failure. Obviously there was a problem with the bars. To land face-first at 65 km/h and then do the same thing again 30 minutes later is truly amazing. He talked about the fighting spirit of the Australians, and to get up and do it again, I'm honestly speechless. That's it." Considering I fell at a fast pace, it was a pretty good time. There is still a bronze medal to be won tomorrow. The youngsters will come back, recover and settle in. The doctor checked him over, but there is nothing to worry about right away. He slid his face down. The skin on his right arm peeled off a bit, but he was lucky. Luckily it is a slip on the course.

Australia won the Team Pursuit at the 2019 World Championships and took silver at the Rio and London Olympics behind Great Britain. To remain in medal contention, they need to finish in the top four in the recompetition. Alex, 25, won a world-record gold medal in team pursuit at the Commonwealth Games, but this was his first Olympic appearance; he won his first world title in team pursuit in 2016 and again in 2017 and 2019.

Kelland O'Brien, Sam Welsford, and Lee Howard were not physically affected by the fall.

Denmark, the favorite to win, led the men's team pursuit with an Olympic record of 3:45.014.

The Australian track team will ride the 2020 Electron Pro from Canadian brand Argon 18. The bikes for Team Pursuit are equipped with an integrated aero cockpit. The cockpit consists of an integrated carbon fiber base bar and an integrated stem, topped with a custom molded carbon fiber aero extension with aero spacers. The damage appears to have occurred in the middle of the stem area of the integrated base bar, with a clean break at the junction just after the stem area merges with the handlebar.

There does not appear to be any obvious areas where weakness could creep in, such as a bolt that was inadvertently over-tightened, but there is a cover on the top of the stem that could allow access to the internal cables if used on a bike with gears or brakes. The bike was unveiled by Cycling Australia (opens in new tab) in February of this year.

It was presented as a collaboration between Argon 18 and Zip. Upon launch, Cycling Australia's release stated: "We developed an integrated drop bar for bunch racing and sprint and custom extension bars for team pursuit," but which of the collaborating brands was responsible for manufacturing the cockpit is unconfirmed. The cockpit itself has a small Argon 18 logo on the base bar, but this is not necessarily evidence of manufacture.

Cycling Australia had also previously announced a partnership with Bastion, a company that specializes in 3D printing titanium, for the manufacture of cockpits.

Despite the failure, the initial release claimed that it operated to standards far beyond the required ISO requirements. 'We raised the maximum proof stress to 350 kgf. This is more than three times the load recommended for BBs in the ISO test standards. The same is true for the cockpit, which was subjected to twice the ISO load in fatigue and extreme strength tests," the press release added. However, it was not confirmed whether the strength tests applied only to the custom extensions or included the base bars.