Steven Burke swops track for road next month after quickly coming to terms with his latest world championship disappointment.

Indeed, the 21-year-old from Colne has already held his post mortem into missing a medal at the Pruszkow velodrome in Poland on Friday night.

Burke, who failed to finish the Points race at the 2008 Manchester championships, and his fellow team pursuiters, Ed Clancy, Johnny Bellis and Peter Kennaugh, lost their bronze medal ride to New Zealand.

But the Olympic individual pursuit third placer said: “We did the best we could.

“The average age of the team was 21 and a couple of the lads, coming off a road campaign, hadn’t had a lot of track time.

“So, considering everything I think we did quite well.

“However, it’s all about 2012 now. Half the team were like the B squad, so to speak.

“And you’ve got to try different combinations and all that. Besides, this is the year to experiment. It’s not all about winning at the World Championship.

“The British Cycling programme is all about winning Olympic medals. It’s just a stepping stone on the way to 2012.

“If I’m being honest we didn’t expect to win really. But we went out to give it our best shot to see what happened.”

Burke came into the champion-ships having just recovered from a bad bout of food poisoning.

Clancy, the sole survivor of Britain’s successful Beijing team pursuit squad, recently recovered from a broken foot.

Both were denied a ride in the individual competition.

“I had really bad sickness only a week ago so I think I just ran out of time to prepare really,” confirmed Burke.

“But it’s all about the road for me now for the next six months.

“I’m going to Italy soon and will be doing a lot of racing out there.

“I’m quite looking forward to that. Then, it’s back inside to the track for the winter season – that’s the plan.

“I will probably do the track World Champs in Denmark next year and the Commonwealth Games in India.”