PETALING JAYA: Sarawak does not even have a velodrome yet but the state can already boast an Asian junior champion cyclist.<\/p>\n
Danial Hakim Zulkaisi pulled off a stunning win in the men\u2019s junior elimination race to claim Malaysia\u2019s first gold medal at the Asian Cycling Championships in Tagaytay, Philippines.<\/p>\n
The 18-year stayed on steady pace at the front from the start and sealed victory with a brazen final sprint attack.<\/p>\n
Danial is the first Malaysian cyclist to win in the men\u2019s junior ranks of the Asian meet since Mohd Firdaus Zonis romped to a triple gold (sprint, keirin and 1km time trial) at Astana, Kazakhstan back in 2014.<\/p>\n
Coming in second behind Danial was Kim Se-won of South Korea and Yau Chung Ming of Hong Kong.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s certainly a big step up for Danial in his second appearance in the Asian meet after he finished last in the points race in last year\u2019s edition at the National Velodrome in Nilai.<\/p>\n
Danial has not only made it to the podium but earned Malaysia\u2019s first ever success in the men\u2019s junior endurance discipline.<\/p>\n
It is the second medal for Malaysia in the junior ranks after Nur Umairah Qhaisara Zulfikha Razak contributed a silver in the women\u2019s sprint event on Thursday.<\/p>\n
The competition comes to an end next Tuesday.<\/p>\n
\u201cTowards the closing moments, I looked behind and saw there were four of us still remaining. I attacked with three remaining as I saw there was a gap and did not let go.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s tiring but I took my chances. I gave it all and I\u2019m happy to win as this is my last appearance in the junior ranks at the Asian Championships,\u201d said Danial, who was recruited into the back-up endurance squad programme late last year.<\/p>\n
Danial, however, missed out on a second medal when he finished fourth with partner Mohd Nazir Afif in the men\u2019s junior Madison race.<\/p>\n
South Korea\u2019s Shin Na-ra-Kim Do-ham took the gold ahead of Huang Sichen-Xu Ruiyi of China while Sotaro Matsuda-Tsukasa Sawano took the bronze for Japan.<\/p>\n
Malaysia\u2019s Davia Evriel Erian Azif a finished fifth in the women\u2019s junior elimination race won by China\u2019s Ding Aonan.<\/p>\n
The sprinters will return today for the sprint qualifying rounds today where Nurul Izzah Izzati Mohd Asri and Mohd Ridwan Sahrom will be looking to achieve personal best times.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PETALING JAYA: Sarawak does not even have a velodrome yet but the state can already boast an Asian…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":568815,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[569],"tags":[64,63,784,935,75962,85,35073],"class_list":{"0":"post-568814","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-cycling","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-cycling","11":"tag-malaysia","12":"tag-nilai","13":"tag-sports","14":"tag-track-cycling"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/568814","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=568814"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/568814\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/568815"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=568814"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=568814"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=568814"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}