Riders end meet with golden shower

national riders concluded their outing with another five titles yesterday for an overall tally of nine gold medals at the Para Asian Track Championships.

As expected, Malaysia won both gold on offer in the men’s and women’s 1km time trial (B) at the National Velodrome in Nilai.

Aiman Asyraff Ahmad Bajuri and pilot Mohd Faizal Noh clocked one minute and 4.480 seconds for their new personal best in the event.

Khairul Nizam Ali with pilot Firdaus Zonis (1:06.589s) as well as Amin Najmi Romzi and pilot Shahrul Nizam Che Samsuddin (1:10.983s) completed a Malaysian sweep.

Asyraff has now set his sights on the Indonesia Para Asian Games.

“It is a great start to the season. The goal was to break our personal best of 1:05.5s (recorded at the 2016 Italy World Championships) and we did it,” said Asyraff.

“The competition between our teammates was quite intense as we all want to earn Asian Games spots and hopefully Faizal and I will be selected after winning this.

“Our goal now is to win the gold in this event at the Asian Games and also break the Asian record of 1:04.2s set by our teammate Afiq Afify Rizan at the KL Asean Para Games last year,” said Asyraff.

Nur Azlia Syafinaz Mohd Zais and pilot Noradillina Adilla J. Sam won the women’s event, their third success after victories in the sprint and pursuit.

Nur Syahida Tajudin and pilot Nurul Suhada Zainal came in second on 1:19.024s.

Najib Turano, Ahmad Tarmizi Zuhairi and Adi Raimie Amizazahan emerged victorious in the team sprint (mixed) in 53.591s.

Yusof Hafizi Shaharuddin won the men’s individual 1km time trial (C1-C3) in 1:11.555s. Japan’s Shota Kawamoto took silver on 1:12.804s while Shukor Farhan Suliman (1:15.378s) completed the podium.

The fifth and final gold for Malaysia came via Zuhairi Ahmad Tarmizi in the C4-C5 class of the same discipline.

Zuhairi won in 1:07.973s with Najib (1:10.867s) settling for bronze. Iran's Mehdi Mohammadi (1:10.595s) was second.