ABERGAVENNY'S Becky James has staked her claim as Victoria Pendleton's natural heir after bagging four golds at Manchester's National Track Championships.

The 20-year-old won the women's 500m time-trial with a personal best of 34.763. and also successfully defended her Keirin title and retained the British women's track cycling sprint title.

As an extra cherry on an already bumper cake, James also won the team sprint alongside her sister Rachel.

Pendleton laid claim to the national sprint title every year between 2002 and 2010, and her success has no doubt inspired Commonwealth silver medalist James who is hoping to emulate the success of the Olympic gold medalist.

Throughout the championships the Abergavenny rocket demonstrated to the cycling world that she is a true force to be reckoned with and said of her performances, "I'm really chuffed, I had in my head what I wanted to achieve and I think it went better than expected. The track nationals is a big event for me. It's a great start to the season."

Now named as part of the Great Britain team for the opening round of the UCI Track Cycling World Cup in Columbia which runs from October 11-13, James will be joined by Olympian Jess Varnish who was part of the GB team that James acted as a reserve rider for in London 2012.

The Cali velodrome is the first of three Track Cycling World Cup rounds in the 2012-13 series, with the second in Glasgow and the final round in Mexico. Following that comes next February's world championships in Minx where James will hope to take the vacancy left by Pendleton.

James explained, "The World Cup in Cali starts my international season and hopefully it can end with my first senior world championships in Belarus in February,

"But first and foremost I need to keep myself healthy and injury free and take it step by step through the season."

Following the disappointment of not being picked for London 2012, James's current form suggests she is a surefire bet for Rio 2016.

The cycling dynamo said, "Watching Great Britain's cyclists produce fantastic performances in London was incredible and as a rider you can only take inspiration from it,

"Having been named a reserve rider for the track it was of course disappointing not be competing because it was my dream to be going.

"But to see everyone perform to the standard that they did in Beijing with no one letting the team down gives me a great deal of motivation to compete in a Games myself one day. Hopefully that will come in Rio in 2016."