As Simon van Velthooven's impressive CV grows, the target on his back gets bigger.

Following the world track championships in Belarus last month, the Manawatu Olympian is home for a few weeks, before heading off for another stint racing on the Japanese keirin circuit.

At Minsk in Belarus, the London Olympics bronze medallist won a silver medal in the kilometre time trial, but was only 10th in his specialist event, the keirin.

So after winning an Olympic bronze, are there more expectations that he should win every time when he jumps on the bike in a keirin race?

"Yes and no," van Velthooven said. "There's still riders out there better than me. I'm definitely one of the targeted riders.

"A lot of riders are watching me, instead of me watching the good riders. They kind of dictate how we race."

He gets plenty of attention on the Japanese keirin circuit because he is an Olympic medallist and while he said some people knew he wasn't targeting the keirin in Minsk, others would expect him to do well every time.

Van Velthooven is taking a break at the moment, after a hard few months. He is heading to Japan on April 15, but will start training early next month.

"Back-to-back seasons kind of took their toll on me. I was battling pretty hard in January, February and pre-nationals, a bit of stress to make the worlds team."

He said he'd pulled through and was taking time off now to get things right.

"It wasn't so much my body, probably more my head. I'd been getting a few headaches stopping me from doing things. They're all gone now and I'm recovering for the up and coming season.

He will be in Japan until September but during that time he will have to race in Germany and Spain in June and July to collect the UCI points he needs to qualify for the World Cup and world championships in Colombia next year.

"If we're smart about it, then we'll be away laughing."

At the world championships he wasn't too disappointed about the keirin result because he was focusing on the kilo time trial, but he will revert his attention to the keirin now.

It was his first big competition race since the Olympics and while he had been hoping for a keirin medal, he said it was a good change.

He has been in the South Island recently and competed in the Motatapu mountainbike event near Arrowtown at the weekend.

- © Fairfax NZ News