The National cycling team before
departing Malaysia for the
Langkawi International Mountain
Bike Challenge. Picture:
BT/Syarif Rasani
The national cycling team departed the nation yesterday to take part in the Langkawi International Mountain Bike (MTB) Challenge (LIMBC) in Kedah, Malaysia.
The Sultanate will be represented by Muhammad Rafiuddin Zikara, Muhammad Raihaan Abd Aziz, Mohamad Nur Jamri Johari.
They will be taking part in two separate races from September 28 to October 5.
Their first race will be the 81km International Cycling Union MTB Marathon Series Race on Saturday.
The second is the LIMBC race stage from Monday to October 5.
All three riders will take part in a 2.4km individual time trial on Saturday to challenge for the leader's jersey for Stage 1 of the five stage course.
Both Raihaan and Rafiuddin will be using this as one of their warm-up sessions in preparation for the upcoming December Southeast Asian (SEA) Games in Myanmar.
Raihaan who has taken on this challenge three times already told The Brunei Times, "MTB is my main event when it comes to cycling."
"From what I have gained so far from taking part in this race is are some valuable experiences.
"I have set my target to try and be the best rider amongst the Asian countries.
"InsyaAllah, I will also be putting up a good fight against the world class riders that will be there.
"With them being there, I will be able to learn a lot more things for my preparation leading up to the SEA GAMES," added Raihaan.
Prior to departure for Langkawi, Rafiuddin said, "This will help me out for the SEA Games because I have only been back into high-intensity for seven months now after taking a one year break from the sport."
"National cyclist coach Yafiz Jamaludin said that I have shown a good level of performance and potential to reach his target," added Rafiuddin.
The main race will see them take on a total of 197.1km.
This will be Stage 1 65km, Stage 2 45km, Stage 3 81km, Stage 4 4.5km and Stage 5 1.6km.
Yafiz riders are at 85-90 per cent peak performance level for the SEA Games.
"What I need to do now is to keep them at that level for one month before we increase," said Yafiz.
"Their last 10 per cent will be built up in during their training camp in Kundasang, Sabah through high altitude training so they will peak during the SEA Games," added Yafiz.
Switzerland's Fabian Giger was the previous overall winner in the men's open last year.
