By Rawle Toney
in Suriname
Suriname’s Jair Tjon En Fa outsprinted a bunch of four cyclists to capture the 60K road race event as the Inter Guiana Games (IGG) cycling events ended yesterday in Paramaribo, Suriname.
En Fa’s win, coupled with the win by Suriname in the team Time Trials on Saturday, saw them riding away with the cycling discipline of the IGG.
Team Guyana had to settle for second place with French Guiana third.
Showing superior sprinting speed En Fa took the event in a time of one hour, 29 minutes 11.30 seconds ahead of his countryman Murvin Arumjo who clocked one hour, 29minutes, 11.54 seconds as the Guyanese were shut out of the top two spots.
Guyana’s Enzo Mathews, however, took third place with a time of one hour, 29 minutes, 11.86 seconds and teammate Geron Williams fourth in one hour, 29 minutes, 12.24 seconds.
The other Guyanese riders, Christopher Holder and Chris Persaud finished eighth and ninth respectively.
With the route of race lined by both Guyanese and Surinamese supporters waving their respective country’s flags, the Guyanese riders led the attack from the start using excellent team strategy to try and outwit their opponents but the home riders matched them pedal for pedal.
Mathews was the pacemaker for most of the early stages with team captain Williams supporting while in the back pack, Persaud and Holder were attacking with good team chemistry.
However, half way through the race, the Surinamese began to apply pressure but the Guyanese still doing a good job as riding as a team while the French Guiana riders were dropped earlier in the race.
“We got this,” shouted one Guyanese supporter in the closing moments of the race as Mathews waved to the crowd.
But it was the Surinamese supporters who all rose in jubilation as En Fa and Arumjo downed
their heads and rose up on their saddles to outsprint the Guyanese some 10 meters from the finish line.
“Boss man, I pull up!” Mathews told Stabroek Sports.
“But I didn’t know Geron (Williams) deh pull-up too, because honestly when I deh raise me hands to ya’ll I was certain we would have won.”
Meanwhile, in the female race, Berbician Marica Dick easily out raced the other four cyclists to win the 30K race.
Dick’s winning time was 56 minutes, 15.67 seconds.
Her teammate Naomi Singh (56 minutes, 40.25 seconds) was third behind Suriname’s Jo-Ann Veldhuizen (56 minutes, 17.04 seconds).
“It was good to win in my first time,” Dick said after the race adding… “especially after yesterday (Saturday) so I’m feeling very happy.”
She and Singh had toyed with the other cyclists even though supporters were shouting, ‘ya’ll stop talking and playing with these people!”
But Dick relied on her massive strength to win the race while Singh was sandwiched between her teammate and Veldhuizen in the sprint to the line.
The local cyclists are expected to return to Guyana today.
