<\/p>\n\n\n\n
NILAI: National ace Datuk Mohd Azizulhasni Awang has got his hands back on the Asian sprint title\u00a0after emerging\u00a0victorious in the Asian Track Cycling Championships (ACC) 2023 at the National Velodrome, here, tonight.
The 35-year-old, who had won the sprint title six times – in\u00a02008, 2009, 2014, 2017, 2019 and 2020 – before skipping last year\u2019s edition to recover from open heart surgery,\u00a0beat Jakarta Nations Cup silver medallist Kaiya Ota of Japan 2-0 (9.924s, 9.828s) in the men\u2019s elite sprint final\u00a0for a record 11th\u00a0gold medal overall in\u00a0the championships.
Earlier in the semi-finals, the Pocket Rocketman, knocked out defending champion Kento Yamasaki of Japan\u00a02-0.
After a day\u2019s rest, Mohd Azizulhasni will begin his quest for his first Asian keirin title in eight years, having last triumphed in his pet event\u00a0at the 2015 edition in Nakhon Ratchasima, Thailand.
\u00a0A victory tomorrow will see him repeat his\u00a0two-gold feat in sprint and keirin that he achieved at the 2008 edition in Nara, Japan, where he also claimed the\u00a0team sprint silver medal.
A tearful Mohd Azizulhasni, who had to be comforted by national head coach John Beasley, admitted to having to overcome\u00a0huge challenges on and off the track to win the title.
\u201cOvercoming the two Japanese riders in the semi-finals and final today was definitely a huge challenge, especially Kaya, who is a world-class sprint rider. I had to be prepared and adopt the right tactic to overcome him.
\u201cIn the first race, I chose to stay behind him and then power away. For the second race, I started in front of him and went full throttle until he ran out of gas at the last bend.
\u201cI am very happy to win my 11th gold medal in the ACC and reach \u2018legendary status\u2019\u2026\u00a0even the Japanese riders have not done this in this championships. I can\u2019t control my emotions right now because I have been dreaming of this gold since taking part in\u00a0Hong Kong (in the International Track Cup) last month,\u201d he told reporters.
Yamasaki had to be contented with third place this time\u00a0after beating compatriot Kohei Terasaki 2-0 in the bronze-medal decider.
In the women\u2019s elite sprint final, Japan\u2019s Riyu Ohta defended her crown by beating compatriot Mina Sato 2-0.
— BERNAMA<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
NILAI: National ace Datuk Mohd Azizulhasni Awang has got his hands back on the Asian sprint title\u00a0after emerging\u00a0victorious in the Asian Track Cycling Championships (ACC) 2023 at the National Velodrome, here, tonight.The 35-year-old, who had won the sprint title six times – in\u00a02008, 2009, 2014, 2017, 2019 and 2020 – before skipping last year\u2019s edition […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":21214,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-21213","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports-tech"},"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jesseltontimes.com\/wpmarch2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21213","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jesseltontimes.com\/wpmarch2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jesseltontimes.com\/wpmarch2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jesseltontimes.com\/wpmarch2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jesseltontimes.com\/wpmarch2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21213"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/jesseltontimes.com\/wpmarch2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21213\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21215,"href":"https:\/\/jesseltontimes.com\/wpmarch2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21213\/revisions\/21215"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jesseltontimes.com\/wpmarch2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21214"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jesseltontimes.com\/wpmarch2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21213"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jesseltontimes.com\/wpmarch2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21213"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jesseltontimes.com\/wpmarch2025\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21213"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}