Svein Tuft cruised to his fourth title in the men's 40-kilometre time trial Friday at the Canadian road cycling championships.

The Langley, B.C., native clocked a time of 51 minutes, 23 seconds in St. Georges, Que., nearly two minutes ahead of second-place finisher Ryan Roth of Bright , Ont. The gap between winner and second place is usually measured in seconds in time trials.

Placing third was Whitehorse's Zach Bell, who finished a further minute behind Roth.

Tuft, who will represent Canada at the Beijing Olympics in both the time trial and road race events in August, called his performance "the best 40K time trial of my life."

Anne Samplonius of Montreal won her second title in the women's 20-km time trial, David Veilleux of Quebec City captured the under-23 men's category and Julie Beveridge of Calgary took the women's under-23 event.

Samplonius, the defending champion, won a close women's race in 29 minutes, 59 seconds, less than 4.5 seconds ahead of Julie Beveridge of Calgary and Alex Wrubleski of Regina.

For Samplonius, the win was tinged with disappointment as she found out a few days earlier that her appeal to win a spot on the Canadian team for the Olympic Games was denied.

Samplonius beat the three Olympic athletes — Wrubleski, Erinne Willock of Victoria and Leigh Hobson of Cambridge, Ont. — to win the time trial title.

With files from the Canadian Press