Finucane

Preparation explained part of the conversation. Watching her ride explained the rest.

Again and again, people used the same word. Smooth.

“She’s got a beautiful style. You could put a teacup on her back and it would not spill,” said two-time Commonwealth champion Katherine Bates.

“She’s got an exceptionally strong core. She does not move at all on the bike, even when putting out maximum power.”

Paralympic gold medalist and Finucane’s former Great Britain team-mate, Jenny Holl, believes that style is difficult to teach.

“Emma looks like she’s one with the bike,” she reveres.

“She’s so smooth, so dialed. She never looks like she’s fighting with it and, for me, that’s the biggest difference. That fluidity seems to give her that extra gear.”

Finucane’s positioning has taken years of refining and discipline.

“She’s so low but that’s really hard work. She’s trained herself to be in that position,” explained Partridge.

“The work she’s put in, the focus on the position and the discipline on her line, all these things add up to making her what she is.”

Perhaps the best example came in the women’s 1km time trial.

While most of the field opted for specialist time-trial handlebars, Finucane chose conventional drop handlebars.

She still won.

Welsh star Emma Finucane has created history by becoming the first sprint cyclist to win four track gold medals at the same Commonwealth Games.

Finucane added keirin success to the golds she had already won in the team and individual sprints and 1,000m time trial.

Olympic champion Ellesse Andrews finished second when defending her Commonwealth keirin title.

In Birmingham in 2022, New Zealand cyclist Aaron Gate won four gold medals with three on the track and one in the road race.

Finucane has achieved her quartet of successes in four successive days in the Chris Hoy Velodrome in Glasgow.

Australian legend Anna Meares and New Zealander Andrews had previously won three track titles in 2010 and 2022 respectively.

The 23-year-old has also become the first Welsh woman to collect four golds at a single Commonwealth Games.

Finucane is also Wales’ most successful female athlete in Games history after overtaking Para-sprinter Olivia Breen, who held the record for two days.

Weightlifter David Morgan remains Wales’ most successful Commonwealth Games athlete with nine golds and three silver.

Finucane won Wales’ 31st medal of the Games with nine gold, 10 silver and 12 bronze.

Olympic champion cyclist Emma Finucane insists she has “nothing to prove” at the Commonwealth Games despite her ambitions of winning an elusive gold in Scotland.

Finucane, 23, collected two bronze medals in Birmingham four years ago but has since won 16 medals at the Olympics, World and European Championships.

The Welsh star says she is targeting “the top step” on the podium in Glasgow.

“I haven’t actually stood on the top step at the Commonwealth Games,” Finucane told BBC Sport Wales.

“That’s something I’d love to achieve this time round.

“I feel like I’m a different person four years on and I can’t wait to show what I can do on the track.”

The Carmarthenshire native credits the Birmingham 2022 Games as the “springboard” to where she is today.

“I would not be where I am today without the Commonwealth Games,” she said.

“The first time I was pretty young, pretty naive to the sport of sprint cycling.

“It was a very overwhelming experience, whereas this time round I feel like I’m more of an established rider.”

She added: “I was 19 [in Birmingham] and the year after I won my first world title, which was crazy for me.

“I think it gave me the confidence I needed as an athlete to develop in my career, and get to where I am so quickly.

“We became Olympic champions two years ago, and I actually don’t even know how that happened.”