A group of six riders, including Barbieri, managed to break away from the main field at the Hong Kong Velodrome before the 20-year-old proved to be too quick in a final sprint. 

She managed to hold off Elinor Barker of Great Britain and Jolien D'Hoore of Belgium for the win. 

Barker, the Olympic team pursuit gold medallist alongside Katie Archibald, Laura Kenny and Joanna Rowsell Shand at Rio 2016, took second while D'Hoore finished with the bronze medal.

New Zealand retained their men's team sprint title after fielding the exact same team as at last year's World Championships in London.

Ethan Mitchell, Sam Webster and Edward Dawkins overcame The Netherlands team of Jeffrey Hoogland, Harri Lavreysen and Matthijs Buchli by 0.333 seconds in the final.

The New Zealand time crossed the line in 44.049sec, while their European rivals finished in 44.382.

The French squad of Benjamin Edelin, Sebastien Vigier and Quentin Lafargue won the bronze medal in 43.536.

They saw off the Polish trio Maciej Bielecki, Rafal Sarnecki and Mateusz Rudyk, who finished in 43.698.

In the women's team sprint competition, Russian duo Daria Shmeleva and Anastasiia Voinova also successfully defended their title with a time of 32.520.

They finished 0.129 seconds ahead of Australian pair Kaarle McCulloch and Stephanie Morton, who crossed the line in 32.649.

Germany's Kristina Vogel, the women's individual Olympic sprint champion at Rio 2016, and Miriam Welte won the bronze in 32.609.

They beat Chinese duo Guo Shuang and Lin Junhong, who posted a time of 33.309.

Action is due to continue tomorrow with the men's and women's team pursuit finals and the men's keirin and scratch race.