Thursday August 6, 2009
Kimbeley stuns elite cast to rule road event
PETALING JAYA: Two-time SEA Games triathlon gold medallist Kimbeley Yap served up a surprise when she bagged the women’s 20km time trial gold in the road competition of the Mini Olympic Games at the Putrajaya Highway yesterday.
Her win against a top field of national elite cyclists comes as a big surprise, considering that she only started training on a road bike five months ago.
The 22-year-old completed the race under wet weather conditions in 23:33.29, ahead of silver medallist Mariana Abdullah (24:00.70).
But Kimbeley can consider herself lucky to have won.
The race began in a confusing manner, with a bunch of riders going the wrong way. After going about half the distance, they gave up and the organisers had to re-start the race.
Kimbeley said the organisers shortened the route from 30km to 20km as they wanted to use the event to select riders for the Asian Cycling Championships in Kalimantan from Aug 15-21. “Some riders went the wrong way and they decided not to take part in the re-start,” said Kimbeley.
“I was among the latter batch to be flagged off and I just continued riding.
“It’s a surprise as I never expected to come out tops. I am still learning and trying to improve myself in road cycling.
“I am looking forward to riding in my first Asian championships now,” added Kimbeley, who currently trains with the national women’s road cycling squad under coach Ng Joo Ngan.
Kimbeley had won medals in swimming at the SEA Games before switching to triathlon, emerging champion at the 2005 and 2007 Games in the Philippines and Thailand respectively.
Since triathlon is not included in the Laos SEA Games in December, she decided to commit herself to cycling this year.
Kimbeley will be taking part in the 3km individual pursuit track event at the Cheras Velodrome this weekend.
In the men’s 40km time trial, Le Tua Cycling team’s Ng Yong Li lived up to his top billing by taking the gold medal in 1’17:39.11.
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