Sawda's Golden Ride Inspires Izzah Izzati To Do Better

NILAI, Feb 24 (Bernama) -- National women's track cycling champion Nurul Izzah Izzati Mohd Asri is ready to take on the challenge of winning the 1-kilometre (km) time trial event after junior athlete Sawda Hasbullah's 'golden' ride at the 2025 Asian Track Cycling Championships (ACT).

Nurul Izzah Izzati said the 17-year-old athlete's achievement has fueled her enthusiasm to perform even better as a senior athlete in the elite category of the event scheduled for this Wednesday.

Yesterday, Sawda created a sensation when she broke the Asian women's junior record for the 1km time trial event to win the first gold for the national junior track cycling squad by recording one minute 10.818 seconds (s), thus cracking the record set by Taiwanese athlete Liu Shang Ying (1:12.722s) in the qualifying round.

"I want to do my best because my junior (Sawda) also managed to record 1:10 minutes so I wouldn't do it the other way around...hopefully I can better the record since I'm a senior athlete.

"Whatever it is, it's a morale booster for me because we've helped each other before. If she joins the elite athletes, she will definitely be a good competitor and we will be able to continue moving forward," she said when met.

The Kedah lass started the ATC 2025 campaign with flying colours when she set a new national record apart from defending the silver medal in the team sprint event, before also defending the bronze she won last year.

She is also hoping that positive results can be reflected in her mission to defend the gold medal in the keirin event that she won in the last edition.

"I have gained confidence in the sprint event so I want to come out more boldly to compete with other riders (in the keirin event)," she said.

-- BERNAMA