Mohammed looking forward to spectacular race
WITH less than two weeks to go before the fifth annual Ministry of Health in collaboration with the Ministry of Culture, Youth and Sports organized and sponsored ‘Ride for Life’ pedals off , national cycling coach Hassan Mohammed told Chronicle Sport he is looking forward to a spectacular event. “We are expecting a large contingent of cyclists from overseas, including Team Coco out of Miami Florida along with another team from the United States of America, while some Guyanese riders residing abroad are expected to be here for the event.
With such a field, coupled with riders from around the Caribbean and right here in Guyana, we may have a large field numbering close to 100 cyclists facing the starter on Thursday, October 6 at the Corriverton Police Station where the first stage pedals off from at 07:00hrs in the morning.”
While Mohammed outlined the starting and finishing points for the five stages of the event which covers a distance of 266 miles (430km), he was confident that the overall and even a few stages record can go down the wayside in this year’s event.
“Taking into consideration, the resurfacing of the roads along the route of the race and based on the performance witnessed by some of the teams last year, I am confident that records in some of the stages and the total time at the end of the event will be broken.
When you look at the overall times recorded by the winner of the event, you would see that last year’s winner Antonia Quintero of Team Coco completed the distance with the fastest time ever while being the first non-national to cart off the top prize of the event,” said Mohammed who along with Nazim Hussain coordinates the race for the sponsors.”
Mohammed was not hesitant in calling on local cyclists to ride as a team, taking a leaf out of Team Coco’s showing last year.
“Some of our cyclists need to understand that victory in some instances, comes through team work and there is no “I” in team. When you look at them competing amongst themselves on the road and in the National Park, you always see a cat and mouse game.
I am 100% certain that if they compete as a team , riding for their club the way Team Coco  did last year, then certainly we will have a local cyclist defending the title at the start of next year’s event which would be a joy to see.”
Asked to comment on the statement made by the Administrative Office of Region Two, where the penultimate stage will be held next Saturday and wherein the statement read “the Region is looking forward to hosting the event with a view to making it the best ever,” Mohammed said that’s a plus for the event.
“It is always good when you can have person put their best foot forward to assist in making any event a success. I was there in the meeting with the regional Administrators along with the Director of Sport Neil Kumar and the ideas they put forward to us were heartening which certainly would make the event a success.”
This year’s event would see cyclists in the caliber of Warren ‘40’ Mc Kay, Robin Persaud, Junior Niles, Eric Sankar, Albert Philander, Frank Travieso, Walter Grant-Stuart, Marlon Williams, Mark Lewis and Raymond Newton challenging Quintero for the title.
However, missing from the line up is the inaugural champion Alonso Greaves of Roraima Bikers Club who was recently involved in an accident where he suffered a fractured left hand, but will be on the sidelines cheering on his clubmates and countrymen.
The previous winners with the year and times in brackets are: Alonso Greaves (2007- 11:04:28), Junior Niles (2008- 10:38:13, Geron Williams (2009- 10: 30: 51) and Antonio Quintero (2010- 10: 18: 26).