Blue skies and red hot racing fire up rescheduled Tour de Kepri
November 5, 2019
The second edition of the Cycosports Tour de Kepri finally got under way last Friday, and after three days of hard racing in the Indonesian island archipelago that gives the race its name, the haze-induced postponement from September was a distant memory. The main titles of the weekend went to Liam Kelly (Specialized Roval Mavericks) and Andrea Trindler (Anza Cycling) as they clinched the respective Men’s Open and Women’s Open titles in dominating fashion.
Every few years or so large swathes of Southeast Asia are afflicted by haze caused by a combination of man-made fires and dry weather. The pollution in the air can be hazardous and causes major disruption to life, including sports events. Unfortunately, part of the region affected by the latest bout of the haze in September included Bintan and Batam, the two islands which the Tour de Kepri is built around. The local authorities felt they couldn’t subject the participants to cycling in the polluted air, so the decision was made to postpone the race.
This was undoubtedly the correct decision, but the major consequence of the delay was that over 100 of the race’s original registrants couldn’t make the rescheduled November 1-3 dates, and so the fields for each of the categories weren’t quite as deep as they would have been on the original dates.
However, a race is a race no matter how many participants there are, and just under 200 men and women still took part across the competitive and gran fondo categories in the 2019 Tour de Kepri, which was the second edition of the race. Like in the inaugural event last year, the race comprised of three stages; a one-hour criterium on the island of Dompak on the Friday afternoon, a 133km tour of Bintan on the Saturday and another 130km road race on the Sunday over the iconic Tour de Barelang route in Batam.
The second edition of the Cycosports Tour de Kepri finally got under way last Friday, and after three days of hard racing in the Indonesian island archipelago that gives the race its name, the haze-induced postponement from September was a distant memory. The main titles of the weekend went to Liam Kelly (Specialized Roval Mavericks) and Andrea Trindler (Anza Cycling) as they clinched the respective Men’s Open and Women’s Open titles in dominating fashion.
Every few years or so large swathes of Southeast Asia are afflicted by haze caused by a combination of man-made fires and dry weather. The pollution in the air can be hazardous and causes major disruption to life, including sports events. Unfortunately, part of the region affected by the latest bout of the haze in September included Bintan and Batam, the two islands which the Tour de Kepri is built around. The local authorities felt they couldn’t subject the participants to cycling in the polluted air, so the decision was made to postpone the race.
This was undoubtedly the correct decision, but the major consequence of the delay was that over 100 of the race’s original registrants couldn’t make the rescheduled November 1-3 dates, and so the fields for each of the categories weren’t quite as deep as they would have been on the original dates.
However, a race is a race no matter how many participants there are, and just under 200 men and women still took part across the competitive and gran fondo categories in the 2019 Tour de Kepri, which was the second edition of the race. Like in the inaugural event last year, the race comprised of three stages; a one-hour criterium on the island of Dompak on the Friday afternoon, a 133km tour of Bintan on the Saturday and another 130km road race on the Sunday over the iconic Tour de Barelang route in Batam.
Kepri is the Bahasa Indonesian acronym for the group of islands that include Bintan and Batam. Both are well-known to the Singapore cycling community for their wide open and traffic-light-free roads, and they are easily accessible via short ferry rides. As staging cycling races in Singapore faces significant logistical, administrative and financial barriers, for the past few years, most of the “local” open-road racing for the Singapore community has actually taken place in Batam and Bintan. These races include the Tour de Barelang, the Nongsa Challenge, the Tour de Kepri, the Tour de Bintan and even the Singapore National Championships, with Cycosports responsible for organising the vast majority of these.
And such is the quality of these races and of the roads/courses they take place on, it’s not just Singapore-based riders that make up the fields, cyclists regularly travel from all over Asia and Australia to compete in these events.
The 2019 Tour de Kepri was no different, even if the numbers were down a bit. Unfortunately, two significant casualties of the date change were last year’s overall winners Chelsie Tan and Paolo Caputo. Current women’s Singapore national champ Tan was racing in China, while the Hong Kong-based Italian rider Caputo had flown to Singapore for the original dates but couldn’t make it last weekend.
Caputo’s Allied World Treknology 3 team were still represented in the 2019 field, though, as were just about every other Singapore team or club, including Cycleworx, Anza Cycling, 4T2, MatadorRacing, the SCF Development Team, Integrated Riding Racing Team, BikeLabz Racing, CyclingTraining.cc, T3 Team Turtle Racing, Singapore Biking Vikings, Greyhounds, Team Harabas, Rapha CC, 30Forty Cycling Team, YBCO BikeAid Racing, Road Brothers, Not My Boyfriend’s Team and the Specialized Roval Mavericks. The Bintan-based ISSI Tanjungpinang were the biggest of the clubs flying the Indonesian flag, while the Cyclemania Racing team from Perth, Australia were also in attendance.
And such is the quality of these races and of the roads/courses they take place on, it’s not just Singapore-based riders that make up the fields, cyclists regularly travel from all over Asia and Australia to compete in these events.
The 2019 Tour de Kepri was no different, even if the numbers were down a bit. Unfortunately, two significant casualties of the date change were last year’s overall winners Chelsie Tan and Paolo Caputo. Current women’s Singapore national champ Tan was racing in China, while the Hong Kong-based Italian rider Caputo had flown to Singapore for the original dates but couldn’t make it last weekend.
Caputo’s Allied World Treknology 3 team were still represented in the 2019 field, though, as were just about every other Singapore team or club, including Cycleworx, Anza Cycling, 4T2, MatadorRacing, the SCF Development Team, Integrated Riding Racing Team, BikeLabz Racing, CyclingTraining.cc, T3 Team Turtle Racing, Singapore Biking Vikings, Greyhounds, Team Harabas, Rapha CC, 30Forty Cycling Team, YBCO BikeAid Racing, Road Brothers, Not My Boyfriend’s Team and the Specialized Roval Mavericks. The Bintan-based ISSI Tanjungpinang were the biggest of the clubs flying the Indonesian flag, while the Cyclemania Racing team from Perth, Australia were also in attendance.
Stage 1, the Dompak Criterium
Organisers Cycosports and their local partners in Bintan have unearthed a bike-racing gem in the shape of the Dompak business park, which is situated on a small island a few kilometres south from the city of Tanjung Pinang, the provincial capital. Its grid-style, wide open and undulating roads are perfect for designing not just one criterium circuit, but two adjacent tracks. This allows for two races to be held concurrently, which halves the time required to run the crits for the competitive categories.
There were six of those competitive divisions at this year’s race: Men’s Open, Masters, Super Masters, Veterans and Sports, and Women’s Open. The action kicked off with the Men’s Open and combined Men’s Super Masters/Veterans, with the format for each race “45 minutes plus three laps”. The Men’s Open were competing on the 2.3km long Circuit A, while the Super Masters/Veterans tackled the 2.8km Circuit B.
Midway through the Open race, a break of six strong riders escaped containing Pierre-Alain Scherwey (Allied World Treknology3), Sabastian Varguese (Cycleworx), Jayden Waters (Cyclemania, and the Specialized Roval Mavericks trio of Bastian Dohling, Victor Michel and Kelly. This septet worked hard together and the gap to the peloton began to grow with each lap completed and it soon became clear the win would come from this group. Kelly due won the uphill sprint battle that ensued to earn his first win of the weekend and the yellow jersey. Michel was the runner-up half a second back, with Waters taking the final spot on the podium. The peloton finished two and a half minutes back.
On the other circuit, the Super Masters and Veterans race was marked by constant attacks, but nothing got away for more than half a lap and the inevitable sprint unfolded. While the other circuit had an uphill finish, Circuit B’s finale featured a long, shallow drag up followed by a sharp downhill left-hand corner to the line. First to hit that line was big Michael Fantin (Anza), comfortably beating teammate Jock Hughson and Robert Ling (Integrated Riding) for the honours among the Super Masters, while Matt Sheridan (4T2) beat Richard Paine (Specialized Roval Mavericks) and Jonathan Earnshaw (YBOC BikeAid) in the Veterans race.
Organisers Cycosports and their local partners in Bintan have unearthed a bike-racing gem in the shape of the Dompak business park, which is situated on a small island a few kilometres south from the city of Tanjung Pinang, the provincial capital. Its grid-style, wide open and undulating roads are perfect for designing not just one criterium circuit, but two adjacent tracks. This allows for two races to be held concurrently, which halves the time required to run the crits for the competitive categories.
There were six of those competitive divisions at this year’s race: Men’s Open, Masters, Super Masters, Veterans and Sports, and Women’s Open. The action kicked off with the Men’s Open and combined Men’s Super Masters/Veterans, with the format for each race “45 minutes plus three laps”. The Men’s Open were competing on the 2.3km long Circuit A, while the Super Masters/Veterans tackled the 2.8km Circuit B.
Midway through the Open race, a break of six strong riders escaped containing Pierre-Alain Scherwey (Allied World Treknology3), Sabastian Varguese (Cycleworx), Jayden Waters (Cyclemania, and the Specialized Roval Mavericks trio of Bastian Dohling, Victor Michel and Kelly. This septet worked hard together and the gap to the peloton began to grow with each lap completed and it soon became clear the win would come from this group. Kelly due won the uphill sprint battle that ensued to earn his first win of the weekend and the yellow jersey. Michel was the runner-up half a second back, with Waters taking the final spot on the podium. The peloton finished two and a half minutes back.
On the other circuit, the Super Masters and Veterans race was marked by constant attacks, but nothing got away for more than half a lap and the inevitable sprint unfolded. While the other circuit had an uphill finish, Circuit B’s finale featured a long, shallow drag up followed by a sharp downhill left-hand corner to the line. First to hit that line was big Michael Fantin (Anza), comfortably beating teammate Jock Hughson and Robert Ling (Integrated Riding) for the honours among the Super Masters, while Matt Sheridan (4T2) beat Richard Paine (Specialized Roval Mavericks) and Jonathan Earnshaw (YBOC BikeAid) in the Veterans race.
The Masters were next up on Circuit A and it was an early breakaway that settled this race. There were initially only two men this time, Steve Robinson (Integrated Riding) and Ben Arnott (Specialized Roval Mavericks), and after the pair opened up a gap of about 30 seconds, they managed to maintain it for a few more times round the circuit. However, when Andreas Ostern (Specialized Roval Mavericks) bridged across, it changed the dynamic and the lead quickly expanded to nearly two minutes due to the increased firepower. Robinson couldn’t hold the pace, though, and dropped off into no-man’s land with a few laps to go. He had done enough to secure third place while the Mavericks pair surged ahead to battle for the win. That honour went to Arnott as he outlasted his teammate up the hill. Their efforts had secured a tidy gap on the peloton of some two minutes, while Robinson still had a minute on the bunch too.
The last crit of the day on Circuit B saw the Men’s Sports and the Women riders start together. The two genders split fairly quickly and, in the Sports contest, it was another affair featuring constant attacks and chases, but there were still seven riders at the bell so the win was anybody’s. Good tactics from the trio of teenagers of the Specialized Roval Mavericks development squad saw them clinch the win, with Edmond Chew earning the gold medal from teammate Jin Yi Toh and Stephen Ng in third.
The women’s field disappointingly only drew five riders. There has been much progress in growing women’s cycling in Singapore in recent years so to have only five riders for the crit plus a few more for the Saturday and Sunday races was a real shame. Still, those who did register and turn up gave it their all and deserve kudos for putting on a great race, the finish of which was the closest across all the contests on Friday afternoon. After a three-up sprint, it was Trindler who just edged the MatadorRacing pair of Christina Liew and Carmela Pearson for the win, who to the naked eye couldn’t be separated. The finish-line video gave second place to Liew.
The last crit of the day on Circuit B saw the Men’s Sports and the Women riders start together. The two genders split fairly quickly and, in the Sports contest, it was another affair featuring constant attacks and chases, but there were still seven riders at the bell so the win was anybody’s. Good tactics from the trio of teenagers of the Specialized Roval Mavericks development squad saw them clinch the win, with Edmond Chew earning the gold medal from teammate Jin Yi Toh and Stephen Ng in third.
The women’s field disappointingly only drew five riders. There has been much progress in growing women’s cycling in Singapore in recent years so to have only five riders for the crit plus a few more for the Saturday and Sunday races was a real shame. Still, those who did register and turn up gave it their all and deserve kudos for putting on a great race, the finish of which was the closest across all the contests on Friday afternoon. After a three-up sprint, it was Trindler who just edged the MatadorRacing pair of Christina Liew and Carmela Pearson for the win, who to the naked eye couldn’t be separated. The finish-line video gave second place to Liew.
Stage 2, the Bintan Classic
Like the other two stages, the course for Day 2 of the Tour de Kepri was a carbon copy from last year’s race. The route took the cyclists on a 133km route from Tanjung Pinang in the south of Bintan, up the east coast then through the centre of the island to the finish on the outskirts of Tanjung Uban. It featured around of 1,000 metres of climbing, but the elevation gain while racing in Bintan is deceiving as there are no big climbs. Instead the island offers an almost non-stop diet of rolling hills, which when combining with the ever-present heat and humidity, makes for a challenging day in the saddle. And Bintan was especially hot for Stage 2, with blue skies all the way and hardly any shade to speak off along the entire route.
The Men’s Open and Masters fields raced together for Stages 2 and 3. On the original September race dates, they were scheduled to have their own separate races, but the reduced numbers meant that this wasn’t logistically feasible. For Stage 2, the two contests ended up being separated to a certain degree anyway, as about 35km into the race, a group of five riders escaped from the bunch, with all five being from the Open cat: Michel and Scherwey were again present and joined this time by the Mavericks pair of Antonio Ciccone and Guillaume Causse, plus Daniel Griffiths (Cyclemania). Some 30km later as the leaders peeled off the coast and turned left onto the infamous section known as the “red road to hell”, Kelly and Dohling put in a big effort to bridge across. With such superior numbers in the break and with even more men behind to control the peloton, it looked certain for a Mavericks victory. But that was not to be the case as it was Griffiths who beat the odds and triumphed in the sprint. Michel turned the tables on Kelly to take second place on the day, but Kelly retained the yellow jersey by two seconds after the bonus seconds were taken into account. The bunch finished four minutes down.
Like the other two stages, the course for Day 2 of the Tour de Kepri was a carbon copy from last year’s race. The route took the cyclists on a 133km route from Tanjung Pinang in the south of Bintan, up the east coast then through the centre of the island to the finish on the outskirts of Tanjung Uban. It featured around of 1,000 metres of climbing, but the elevation gain while racing in Bintan is deceiving as there are no big climbs. Instead the island offers an almost non-stop diet of rolling hills, which when combining with the ever-present heat and humidity, makes for a challenging day in the saddle. And Bintan was especially hot for Stage 2, with blue skies all the way and hardly any shade to speak off along the entire route.
The Men’s Open and Masters fields raced together for Stages 2 and 3. On the original September race dates, they were scheduled to have their own separate races, but the reduced numbers meant that this wasn’t logistically feasible. For Stage 2, the two contests ended up being separated to a certain degree anyway, as about 35km into the race, a group of five riders escaped from the bunch, with all five being from the Open cat: Michel and Scherwey were again present and joined this time by the Mavericks pair of Antonio Ciccone and Guillaume Causse, plus Daniel Griffiths (Cyclemania). Some 30km later as the leaders peeled off the coast and turned left onto the infamous section known as the “red road to hell”, Kelly and Dohling put in a big effort to bridge across. With such superior numbers in the break and with even more men behind to control the peloton, it looked certain for a Mavericks victory. But that was not to be the case as it was Griffiths who beat the odds and triumphed in the sprint. Michel turned the tables on Kelly to take second place on the day, but Kelly retained the yellow jersey by two seconds after the bonus seconds were taken into account. The bunch finished four minutes down.
Within that bunch, the battle for the Masters stage win was taking place, and this time it was Ostern who triumphed in the sprint from Thomas Schulz (Integrated Riding) in second and Ulrich Rasmussen (Singapore Biking Vikings). The Norwegian Ostern also assumed the yellow jersey from teammate Arnott due to the 10 bonus seconds for the stage win.
The Super Masters/Veterans race was again marked by plenty of attacks from various individuals but a strong Anza team defended the yellow jersey well. There was some attrition along the “red road” rollers, but most of the bunch was still together until the closing stages, with a short, sharp hill less than 2km from the finish line finally causing a significant separation. The yellow jerseys of Fantin and Sheridan were still there, though, and it was those two men who again claimed line honours. Fantin edged teammate Hughson for the second day in a row in the Super Masters, with Michael Whitesides (Greyhounds) taking third place. Marco Baggioli was the runner-up to Sheridan, but the winner had a comfortable five-second margin. Paine was the third Veteran.
The Super Masters/Veterans race was again marked by plenty of attacks from various individuals but a strong Anza team defended the yellow jersey well. There was some attrition along the “red road” rollers, but most of the bunch was still together until the closing stages, with a short, sharp hill less than 2km from the finish line finally causing a significant separation. The yellow jerseys of Fantin and Sheridan were still there, though, and it was those two men who again claimed line honours. Fantin edged teammate Hughson for the second day in a row in the Super Masters, with Michael Whitesides (Greyhounds) taking third place. Marco Baggioli was the runner-up to Sheridan, but the winner had a comfortable five-second margin. Paine was the third Veteran.
Stage 3, the Barelang Classic
The Tour de Kepri concludes with a trip along the iconic Batam Six Bridges route, which was made famous by the one-day Tour de Barelang classic. Cycosports have incorporated that race into the Tour de Kepri but still allow for people to enter Stage 3 and contest it as a one-day race in its own right. This concept swelled the fields significantly for all the categories.
The three competitive pelotons plus a big gran fondo bunch set off at five-minute intervals from the hustling and bustling grand city square in Batam Centre. The first 14km of the 131km route was neutralised, but when the road turned left onto the Barelang Highway, the racing was on in earnest. The route from there takes a direct line southeast and travels across six bridges connecting Batam to six other small islands, before u-turning at a tiny roundabout as the road suddenly ends. The first and by far biggest of these bridges is the eponymous Barelang Bridge, a towering edifice whose suspension spans can be seen from afar. It’s on the apex of this bridge that the finish line is set up, some 55km after the turn. It’s not just the six bridges that make the route such a hard route, there’s also hardly any flat for the entire length of the Barelang Highway. Like Bintan, there are no big hills, but the climbs seem steeper and longer than those in Bintan and there is even less shade along the route. Thankfully for the riders it was a more overcast day which helped take a few degrees off the temperature.
The Tour de Kepri concludes with a trip along the iconic Batam Six Bridges route, which was made famous by the one-day Tour de Barelang classic. Cycosports have incorporated that race into the Tour de Kepri but still allow for people to enter Stage 3 and contest it as a one-day race in its own right. This concept swelled the fields significantly for all the categories.
The three competitive pelotons plus a big gran fondo bunch set off at five-minute intervals from the hustling and bustling grand city square in Batam Centre. The first 14km of the 131km route was neutralised, but when the road turned left onto the Barelang Highway, the racing was on in earnest. The route from there takes a direct line southeast and travels across six bridges connecting Batam to six other small islands, before u-turning at a tiny roundabout as the road suddenly ends. The first and by far biggest of these bridges is the eponymous Barelang Bridge, a towering edifice whose suspension spans can be seen from afar. It’s on the apex of this bridge that the finish line is set up, some 55km after the turn. It’s not just the six bridges that make the route such a hard route, there’s also hardly any flat for the entire length of the Barelang Highway. Like Bintan, there are no big hills, but the climbs seem steeper and longer than those in Bintan and there is even less shade along the route. Thankfully for the riders it was a more overcast day which helped take a few degrees off the temperature.
The Men’s Open race turned into a one-man affair as race leader Kelly launched an audacious attack some 65km from the finish line and it stuck. Having never ridden the course, Kelly claimed post-race that he had been told the u-turn was just ahead and he was merely making sure he had good position into the only technical feature of the entire route. But in reality, he was at least 10km from the turn and when he went nobody followed and with so many teammates from the combined Open and Masters field behind to control any chase attempts, his gap eventually grew to over three minutes. Kelly did tire and the gap did start to come down, but he crossed the line with nearly two minutes to spare. Michel led the bunch home for his third successive second place finish, which of course gave him P2 on the final general classification behind Kelly. Stage 2 winner Griffiths finished third on the day, and with Scherwey finishing safely in the bunch, the big Swiss claimed third place on the final GC podium.
Kelly was an understandably happy man post-race.
“It feels great to have won the race. Riding with the Mavericks is always good fun, but to win this race is a surprise to be honest, I really didn’t expect it,” Kelly said. “The first stage was great, what a great criterium course, I’d love to ride a motor bike round that course, Saturday was challenging but good, and today was hard, those rollers. I never thought I would stop seeing another pimple, another hill. They just kept coming and coming and coming. Yeah, it was hard, harder than I thought.”
So why did he attack from so far out?
The Men’s Open race turned into a one-man affair as race leader Kelly launched an audacious attack some 65km from the finish line and it stuck. Having never ridden the course, Kelly claimed post-race that he had been told the u-turn was just ahead and he was merely making sure he had good position into the only technical feature of the entire route. But in reality, he was at least 10km from the turn and when he went nobody followed and with so many teammates from the combined Open and Masters field behind to control any chase attempts, his gap eventually grew to over three minutes. Kelly did tire and the gap did start to come down, but he crossed the line with nearly two minutes to spare. Michel led the bunch home for his third successive second place finish, which of course gave him P2 on the final general classification behind Kelly. Stage 2 winner Griffiths finished third on the day, and with Scherwey finishing safely in the bunch, the big Swiss claimed third place on the final GC podium.
Kelly was an understandably happy man post-race.
“It feels great to have won the race. Riding with the Mavericks is always good fun, but to win this race is a surprise to be honest, I really didn’t expect it,” Kelly said. “The first stage was great, what a great criterium course, I’d love to ride a motor bike round that course, Saturday was challenging but good, and today was hard, those rollers. I never thought I would stop seeing another pimple, another hill. They just kept coming and coming and coming. Yeah, it was hard, harder than I thought.”
So why did he attack from so far out?
“Because (teammate) Bastian Dohling told me the turnaround was 2km away … but he was wrong! So, I got to the top of a hill with Pierre-Alain, he sort of blew and I just went. And that was it. Blame Bastian, nothing to do with me,” Kelly joked.
The Sydney-based rider was effusive in his praise for the Tour de Kepri.
“The Tour de Bintan was great, but this was better. They had unbelievable bad luck with the haze and having to cancel and reschedule it as I’m sure it would have been more popular if not for the change. But the organisation was incredible and the local community support was unbelievable, I’ve never seen anything like that before,” he said. “And I’d recommend this race to any rider, whether that be amateur, pro or ex-pro.”
The Masters race was decided from the combined bunch sprint, but it nearly wasn’t, as Danny Feng (Specialized Roval Mavericks) was hauled in an agonising 50 metres from the line thwarting a late bid for glory. In the end it was his teammate Trent Iliffe who benefitted from the rampaging peloton and a tidy sprint to take the stage win. The yellow jersey of Ostern was second, with Robinson clinching his second podium of the weekend in third. Ostern was crowned the overall winner, with Arnott in second and Robinson in third.
The Sydney-based rider was effusive in his praise for the Tour de Kepri.
“The Tour de Bintan was great, but this was better. They had unbelievable bad luck with the haze and having to cancel and reschedule it as I’m sure it would have been more popular if not for the change. But the organisation was incredible and the local community support was unbelievable, I’ve never seen anything like that before,” he said. “And I’d recommend this race to any rider, whether that be amateur, pro or ex-pro.”
The Masters race was decided from the combined bunch sprint, but it nearly wasn’t, as Danny Feng (Specialized Roval Mavericks) was hauled in an agonising 50 metres from the line thwarting a late bid for glory. In the end it was his teammate Trent Iliffe who benefitted from the rampaging peloton and a tidy sprint to take the stage win. The yellow jersey of Ostern was second, with Robinson clinching his second podium of the weekend in third. Ostern was crowned the overall winner, with Arnott in second and Robinson in third.
The Super Masters/Veterans contest still had basically the entire combined field together with some 30km to go despite it being another day marked by constant attacks and chases. But then the cohesion blew to bits first due to a crash that took down a significant number of riders, including Hughson and some of the other contenders. Then it exploded again but this time as the result of an attack finally sticking. Eight men got away, including both yellow jerseys. About 15km from the finish, Alan Grant (Specialized Roval Mavericks) attacked solo and he managed to stay away and took the win by the margin of 18 seconds. Behind, the seven-man chase group tore up the bridge led by Sheridan who beat them all across the line to earn the clean sweep of wins in the Veterans category. Fantin was the runner-up in the Super Masters field and thanks to the six Stage 3 bonus seconds and the 25-second lead he had on Grant going into Stage 3, he clinched the overall title by just one second. Whitesides was third on the day and on the final GC. In the Veterans, Paine was second from the lead group on the stage, while Earnshaw took third from the bunch some five minutes back. Paine was also second on the final GC, with Baggioli third.
The Men’s Sports race was the category most affected by the addition of the day racers. The main move of the day occurred after the u-turn and there were only two of the GC contenders in the seven-strong group that escaped. Toh was one of them and he then attacked the lead group along with Arfan Faisal and Daraek Daraek (ISSI Tanjungpinang) late in the race. It turned into a two-up sprint up the bridge for the win between Toh and Faisal and it was the young Maverick who triumphed to claim the stage and the GC title. Dareak was third on the day, while in the overall standings, Chew finished second, with Ahmad taking the last spot on the podium.
The Men’s Sports race was the category most affected by the addition of the day racers. The main move of the day occurred after the u-turn and there were only two of the GC contenders in the seven-strong group that escaped. Toh was one of them and he then attacked the lead group along with Arfan Faisal and Daraek Daraek (ISSI Tanjungpinang) late in the race. It turned into a two-up sprint up the bridge for the win between Toh and Faisal and it was the young Maverick who triumphed to claim the stage and the GC title. Dareak was third on the day, while in the overall standings, Chew finished second, with Ahmad taking the last spot on the podium.
The Women’s field again split up significantly on Stage 3, but this time Trindler had company for the day in the shape of Pearson. And indeed it was the MatadorRacing rider who took the win this time after another tight photo finish. Liew and Nicolette Tan (Anza Cycling) came in seven minutes later, with Liew claiming third place after pulling away on the slope up to the finish. Trindler was of course the overall winner, with Pearson’s Stage 3 efforts being enough for her to trade third place for second with teammate Liew.
The racing done, the riders enjoyed the traditional Tour de Barelang buffet spread, some cold drinks and the closing ceremony, before the majority of them boarded coaches for the ferry terminal and the short trip back to Singapore.
Despite the reduced participatory numbers, the 2019 Tour de Kepri was a big success and showed off again the great relationship that has been developed by Cycosports, the authorities in the Kepri islands and the Singapore cycling community.
Cycosports chief Kent McCallum was certainly a happy man after taking a few hours to reflect on the long weekend.
"It was a fantastic weekend of racing. With so many moving parts, we were extremely grateful for the support of the local provinces and the tourism board,” McCallum said. “While the event took a hit with the postponement, we were pleased with the numbers and the support of the teams."
Full results from the 2019 Tour de Kepri can be found by clicking on this link.
All photos courtesy of Cycosports unless otherwise stated.
The racing done, the riders enjoyed the traditional Tour de Barelang buffet spread, some cold drinks and the closing ceremony, before the majority of them boarded coaches for the ferry terminal and the short trip back to Singapore.
Despite the reduced participatory numbers, the 2019 Tour de Kepri was a big success and showed off again the great relationship that has been developed by Cycosports, the authorities in the Kepri islands and the Singapore cycling community.
Cycosports chief Kent McCallum was certainly a happy man after taking a few hours to reflect on the long weekend.
"It was a fantastic weekend of racing. With so many moving parts, we were extremely grateful for the support of the local provinces and the tourism board,” McCallum said. “While the event took a hit with the postponement, we were pleased with the numbers and the support of the teams."
Full results from the 2019 Tour de Kepri can be found by clicking on this link.
All photos courtesy of Cycosports unless otherwise stated.