New Zealand sprinter Eddie Dawkins battled pain and an injured hand to finish fourth in the men's sprint at the track cycling World Cup in Mexico.
Dawkins, who crashed heavily in training, took his place in the team sprint to ensure they met their qualification obligations for the world championships.
Had the team been forced to scratch, New Zealand faced being ruled ineligible for February's world championships.
They finished eighth with Dawkins clearly struggling on third wheel with his heavily bruised backside and his hand skinned from the fall.
With a further day to recover, Dawkins came out firing on all cylinders to be 12th fastest in qualifying for the 200 metres sprint in 9.668 seconds, bettering the fastest time by a New Zealander of 9.907 seconds that he set at the recent Oceania Championship.
Dawkins them produced a superb piece of tactical riding and speed to beat Germany's Robert Forstemann, the World Cup sprint winner at Manchester last month, in the first round of elimination racing.
He then disposed of Olympic medallist Maximilian Levy of Germany in two straight rides in the quarter-final before he was beaten by London gold medallist Jason Kenny in the semis in two photo finishes, and had to ultimately settle for fourth.
