TANGKAK \u2014 Norwegian sprint legend Alexander Kristoff received a guard of honour before the start of the final stage of the 2025 Le Tour de Langkawi (LTdL) today, marking his official retirement from professional cycling.<\/p>\n
During the ceremony at Dataran Tangkak Ledang here today, the 38-year-old was given the\u00a0special send-off before the start of Stage Eight of LTdL 2025 by being\u00a0escorted to the starting line on a trishaw ridden by Malaysian road cycling legend Anuar Manan.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Riders from the peloton lined both sides of the road, raising their bicycles in salute as Kristoff waved to the crowd in an emotional farewell.<\/p>\n
Kristoff, who crashed during Stage Seven from Melaka to Medini yesterday, was unable to start today\u2019s final stage from Tangkak to Kuala Lumpur.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m already retired now because I cannot race today after yesterday\u2019s crash, but it\u2019s nice to be here to say goodbye.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was hoping to finish the race, but still,\u00a0to get an honour ceremony like this means a lot. It\u2019s been an honour to be in the pro peloton for so many years,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Among his notable achievements are victories in Milan-San Remo (2014), Tour of Flanders (2015), four Tour de France stage wins\u00a0and the European Championship (2017), along with podium finishes at the Olympic Games and World Championships.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, Kristoff said he will continue to contribute to the sport as part of the Tour of Norway organising committee.<\/p>\n
\u201cI look forward to working with the Tour of Norway organisation. But I will also be busy at home because my fifth son will be born in February,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Kristoff, who made his LTdL debut this year, praised the organisation and the safety of the Malaysian race.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s been cool to be here for the first time. The race was very secure\u00a0and well-organised. If I were\u00a0still racing, I\u2019d\u00a0definitely come back,\u201d he said. \u2014 October 5, 2025<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TANGKAK \u2014 Norwegian sprint legend Alexander Kristoff received a guard of honour before the start of the final…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":191069,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[569],"tags":[121023,121024,64,63,784,54300,112820,85],"class_list":["post-191068","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-alexander-kristoff","tag-anuar-manan","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-cycling","tag-ltdl","tag-road-cycling","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/191068","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=191068"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/191068\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/191069"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=191068"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=191068"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=191068"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}