WHILE Italian Marco Benfatto won the final stage of Le Tour de Langkawi (LTdL) yesterday, top honours went to Team Sapura Cycling’s (TSC) Benjamin Dyball who clinched the overall title with minimal fuss.
The eighth and final stage, which started at Dataran Lang and ended in Kuah town, Langkawi, saw riders looping the island covering a total distance of 103.8km.
Benfatto of Androni Giocattoli-Sidermec, won the bunch sprint, crossing the finish line in two hours, 17 minutes and 42s with Aussie Blake Quick (St George Continental Cycling Team) and Androni’s Matteo Pelucchi finishing second and third.
Dyball’s title hopes suffered a minor scare when the Australian encountered mechanical issues in the second half of the race but he was still able to seal victory in the general classification (GC) after arriving at the finish line in the same group as Benfatto.
The 29-year-old, who won the Genting Highlands queen stage on Tuesday, paid homage to his team after his victory.
“The Genting Highlands stage was always going to be the key stage of the tour. The team committed fully to me and I was able to win it (stage four),” said Dyball, who is not a man of many words.
“They rode perfectly after that and controlled the race, I could not have asked for anything else.”
TSC are only the second Malaysian team after Terengganu Cycling Team (TSG) to win the LTdL yellow jersey. Success has come fast for them as TSC were only set up in 2017.
Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad is pleased with the progress made by Malaysian cycling teams since LTdL was launched over two decades ago.
Mahathir said the performance of the local teams in recent LTdL seasons proved that Malaysians have come a long way in the sport.
TSC team manager Sayuti Zahit said they have now set their medium-term sights on Europe.
“We are grateful to be able to win the yellow jersey this year after three years of trying. It took a lot of hard work and focus from all our team members to achieve continual improvement,” said Sayuti.
“We spent two to three months in a year in Europe previously but hopefully we want to race for six to seven months in Europe next season.
TSC’s Muhammad Zawawi Azman won the best Malaysian rider category at LTdL this year while American Travis McCabe (Floyd’s Pro Cycling), as expected, clinched the green jersey (sprinters classification).
Vadim Pronskiy (Vino-Astana Motors) clinched the white jersey (Asian classification) while Angus Lyons secured the red jersey (climbers classification) on Friday.
Vino emerged as the best team in the Asian team classification while the Malaysia’s national team were second.