But it would have been close. The 33-year-old from Dunedin clocked 4min 12.436sec in winning the national title, which was among the ten fastest times in history at sea level.

That would have won him the gold medal at last year's Gold Coast Commonwealth Games, where he competed on the road rather than the track and took bronze in the time trial.

And while Bond would still have been a little off the time of the fourth fastest finisher in the heats in Pruszków, Alexander Evtushenko of Russia, who joined third-placed Davide Plebani of Italy in the bronze medal ride by clocking 4.11.957, who is to say that the stimulus of world class competition would not have caused this world class competitor to up his game?

We, and he, will never know, as, in their finite wisdom, Cycling New Zealand chose not to select the man who had swapped rowing for cycling in the wake of his second successive Olympic victory in the men's pair with Eric Murray.

Two reasons were cited. Firstly was that his performance - which also saw him beat the 2017 world champion Jordan Kerby - had come too late for the January 29 cut-off point for selection to the World Championships. 

Second was that the emphasis for limited funds would be on Olympic events - with the 4,000 metres individual pursuit dropped since the Beijing 2008 Games.

The strength of the latter reason was diminished to the point of disappearance by the fact that Bond offered to pay his own way in order to have a chance to compete for the rainbow jersey in an event boasting previous champions of the calibre of Britain's Sir Bradley Wiggins.

"I guess the point that irked me is I think I'm now the second fastest pursuit rider this season and I'm not allowed at the World Championships," Bond told Stuff.

"No effort was made to get me there. Why have the world champs if you can't get the best people along to compete?"

A month before he won his national title, Bond was named in the top 50 in Sports Illustrated's annual list of fittest athletes in the world.

The US magazine ranked Bond as the 19th fittest man, behind names such as the National Basketball Association's LeBron James, who was seventh, Irish UFC fighter Conor McGregor, who was ninth, and Portuguese footballer Cristiano Ronaldo, who was second.

"A two-time Olympic gold medallist in the coxless pair at London 2012 and Rio 2016 and world champion for six consecutive years, New Zealand's Hamish Bond dominated rowing for nearly a decade," was the verdict of the panel of high performance experts and physical trainers.

"But the 32-year-old is now looking to make his mark in a second sport, switching to road cycling with an eye on Tokyo 2020 - clear evidence of his peak conditioning."

Unsurprisingly, despite being assured that he still had a shot at getting into the New Zealand team pursuit line-up, which has an Olympic target in 2020, Bond's attitude to his new sport underwent something of a revision.

He still has an eye on Tokyo 2020 - only back in his original sport of rowing, having become part of a freshly combined New Zealand eight that will make its international debut later this month at the World Rowing Cup in Poznań, Poland.

Bond, who turned 33 on February 17, will be far from the oldest man aboard - that distinction falls to his fellow double Olympic champion, single sculler Mahé Drysdale, who is 40.

Were these two to take to the water with their major medals round their necks when the second of this season's three World Cups takes place between June 21 to 23 their boat would sink into Poznań's Lake Malta regatta course.

Both have Olympic golds from London 2012 and Rio 2016. Drysdale has an additional Olympic bronze from the Beijing 2008 Games, five world titles between 2005 and 2011 and three world silvers - all in single sculls.

Bond has an additional eight world golds, all won in partnership with Murray, who retired after the last Olympics.

At the London 2012 Games, Bond and Murray took six seconds off the world record in their heat - a gauntlet thrown down with sufficient force to cause a tidal wave.

In the intervening years they won at the 2013, 2014 and 2015 World Championships, doubling up at the 2014 edition in Amsterdam to take an additional gold in the coxed pair - setting a world best time in the process.

Their victory in Rio brought to a close an unbeaten run stretching back to 2009 and encompassing 69 races.

Last year World Rowing awarded them its highest honour, the Thomas Keller Medal, acknowledging "an exceptional rowing career and exemplary sportsmanship".

You would think all that would be enough. For most athletes it would be. But serial winners seem unable to stop.

Last year Drysdale had another shot at the single sculls, but lost out in the national trials to Robbie Manson, who went on to finish fifth in last year's World Championship final in Plovdiv.

Instead, the veteran warrior integrated himself into the four, which missed a medal by 0.11sec.

The New Zealand eight - sixth in the Rio 2016 Games final - finished last in the repechage at last year's World Championships as gold went to defending champions Germany, in front of Australia and Britain.

Discussing his cycling career with Stuff, Bond reflected: "Your heart has to be in the right place to really commit to something like that and perhaps it wasn't.

"What day to day training and environment was I going to enjoy the most? I thought the eight."

This month's World Cup will see this revamped, re-veteraned crew measure its power and prospects against the top boats as it looks ahead to the next World Rowing Championships that will be held in Ottensheim, Austria from August 25 to September 1.

Realistically, a medal looks like a very long shot for the men in black, with Germany and Britain already looking ominously good in taking respective gold and silver at the recent European Championships in Lucerne. But with competitors like Drysdale and Bond aboard, strange things can happen.