Dubai: Al Nasr Club riders came up with a tactical race to bag top honours in the elite open category while Rashid Mattar Al Daheri topped the hand-cycling category in the road cycle race of the Fourth Nad Al Sheba (NAS) Ramadan Sports Tournament late on Friday.
With the men’s elite road race held over 75 kms, the Al Nasr Club riders were always at the top of the pack sheltering their star Yousuf Al Mirza all the way. As planned earlier during the team meeting, a few of them tried to breakaway on the first loop itself, but the other riders stayed hard on their trail.
“We did the same breakaway move in the second loop, and for some reason the other riders stayed behind on Yousuf’s tail. And that is exactly what we had planned. After that it was just staying free from the peloton and going for the win,” new champion Jaber Hussain Al Mansouri told Gulf News after receiving his gold medal from Tournament Director Hassan Al Mazrouei and Osama Al Shaffar, President, UAE Cycling Federation (UAE CF).
Since the past one month, the ten-member cycling squad from Al Nasr has been preparing along with Al Mirza in Portugal. During the past few weeks, they have travelled to Algeria and Tunisia while also participating in the Tour of Portugal. While most of this is meant to be part of Al Mirza’s preparations for the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympic Games, the other riders have been preparing for the upcoming season.
“We can say that this was a true team effort. All of us knew what responsibility each one had to shoulder during the race. In the end we made all the others riders into believing that Yousuf would try and make the push on the final loop. But nothing like that happened, and before any of the others realised the front breakaway pack was way ahead to be caught by anyone,” Al Mansouri related.
Al Mirza, who eventually finished way down in 16th was thrilled with the way the race evolved tactically. “Our strategy worked and that was important to us for all the hard work put in during our training in Europe,” Al Mirza said.
“I will spend a couple of days at home and then head back to Portugal to continue my training schedule for the Olympic Games,” Mirza related.
In the hand cycle race held over 22.6 kms, it was Rashid Mattar Al Daheri pacing his race to the best while breaking off in the final three kilometres to finish clear of Bader Abbas Yaseen Al Hosani and Abdullah Abdul Hamid.
Al Dhaheri finished with a time of 43 minutes and four seconds while Al Hosani and Abdul Hamid had times of 43.07 and 43.08 minutes respectively. Hussain Al Mazem and Ali Saeed Al Sa’adi completed the top-five with identical times of 43.09 minutes.
RESULTS
(Hand-cycling race) 1. Rashid Mattar Al Dhaheri (43.04); 2. Bader Abbas Yaseen Al Hosani (43.07); 3. Abdullah Abdul Hamid (43.08); 4. Hussain Al Mazem (43.09); Ali Saeed Al Sa’adi (43.09).
(75km road race for Elite UAE riders) 1. Jaber Hussain Ahmad Abdullah (1:38.21); 2. Nasser Saif Saeed Ali Al Mermari (1:38.23); 3. Ahmad Yousuf Al Mansouri (1:38.24); 4. Majid Mohammad Al Beloushi (1:38.58).
