SINGAPORE – The teams competing in the OCBC Cycle Speedway SEA Championships had now not only 
each other to deal with on Saturday (May 11) at the Singapore Sports Hub, but also bad weather.
A thunderstorm in the late morning made the roads surrounding the Kallang hub slippery, which made it difficult for a few riders to barter bends and turns at some point of the race, that is part of the OCBC Cycle occasion.
But, with careful driving, the Philippines – runners-up last year – won the 2019 version in 19 min 19.55sec, just 0.03 seconds ahead of Malaysia (19:19.58). Vietnam was third (19:20.Forty eight) whilst Singapore exited the 9-group competition inside the initial round.
In this race, a group of 4 cyclists will journey a total of 10 laps – two riders will entire 5 rounds of a flat 1km route before passing the baton to their teammates – and the triumphing time is the average of that published via the latter two cyclists.
The Philippines captain John Mier, 26, said: “We sense very happy due to the fact we did our satisfactory and performed our purpose of being the champions. We did not expect the win because the other teams additionally had very sturdy cyclists.
“The rain become additionally a hassle due to the fact the roads had been slippery on the corners so we had to take care and slow down at the corners.”
Mier and his teammates have been second to Thailand and Malaysia – which traded leadership of the race – within the first 5 rounds, however, fell to fourth at the changeover before the sixth lap.
But the Filipinos caught up with the leaders by means of the 7th round and were neck and neck with Malaysia within the penultimate spherical, and clinched the name after their riders finishing first and 5th within the 4-crew final.
“Our strategy this year changed into to hold our two quickest riders as the 0.33 and fourth riders and we had one man inside the front and the sprinter inside the again,” said Mier.
Vietnam captain Phan Hoang Thai turned into pleasantly surprised his group finished at the podium on Saturday.
The 21-12 months-antique stated: “It’s our first time here and these days we worked well with every different. Together we all gave our 100 in step with cent. We desire that next year when we come back we’ll be capable of winning the race.”
Meanwhile, within the OCBC Cycle Speedway Club Championships, protecting champions Specialised Roval Mavericks Team B defended their name in 17: forty-nine .39.
The Mavericks entered two teams this yr and each made the finals, which gave them an introduced opportunity to reclaim their name within the 5-club very last.
Team captain Benjamin Arnott, forty-eight said: “We had been lucky that we had two groups so we may want to paintings collectively as a 4 to create an opening for one of our riders to take the lead. When it came down to the very last dash we just depended on our very last sprinters to get the nice area they could in the first and 5th function.”
Also, the OCBC Cycle Speedway Corporate Club Championships – which took a ruin remaining year – returned with six teams, with GalaxoSmithKline claiming the gold in 19:forty eight.45.
Team captain Alastair Reed, 38, said: “We took it a bit extra seriously this year and we had a better idea of the race layout and the way it works. But I assume greater importantly we were given two new riders that joined us and we have been training collaboratively lots more than we’ve in previous years.”
OCBC Cycle maintains on Sunday (May 12) with the mass participation rides The Sportive Ride (42km) and The Straits Times Ride (23km) at the Sports Hub.
