Mongolian cyclist became world champion

Odonchimeg 2016-08-24 04:08

Sports

18-year-old Mongolian cyclist claims country’s first Gold medal in UCI championships. Cyclist Tegshbayar Batsaikhan brought the first gold medal of Mongolia from 2016 UCI Junior World Championships of Track Cycling, held in AIgle, Switzerland.

18-year-old Mongolian cyclist claims country’s first Gold medal in UCI championships. Cyclist Tegshbayar Batsaikhan brought the first gold medal of Mongolia from 2016 UCI Junior World Championships of Track Cycling, held in AIgle, Switzerland. Tegshbayar won the Scratch Race on Day 2 of the UCI competitions, in the evening of July 21 local time. “For Mongolia’s first participation at this event, they claimed a gold medal in the Scratch Race. It was also a celebration for the UCI World Cycling Centre, where Batsaikhan Tegshbayar has been training since April. After only just qualifying for the final in the afternoon, he unleashed everything in the evening, hitting out with eight laps to go and racing to gold. Never before had Mongolia entered an athlete in the UCI Junior Track Cycling World Championships. So with his participation at this year’s edition at the UCI World Cycling Centre (WCC) in Aigle, Switzerland, Tegshbayar Batsaikhan was already making history. Then, on Thursday evening, he surprised more than a few athletes and spectators by racing to victory in the Scratch Race and claiming the rainbow jersey. The Centre’s coaches detected the young Mongolian’s talent when he attended a short training camp at the WCC satellite centre in Korea in 2015. After studying the data from his performances on the Wattbike (stationary training bike) the coaches contacted the Mongolian Cycling Federation at the beginning of 2016 and invited him to join the trainees based in Aigle. UCI WCC Director Frédéric Magné added that this success story was testament to the centre’s talent identification and training programmes. Batsaikhan’s progress since arriving at the UCI WCC has been impressive. Even so, probably few of the athletes or spectators in the velodrome on Thursday evening would have suspected such a performance from this Mongolian lining up against 20 talented athletes from some of cycling’s leading nations. Indeed, he was lucky to qualify for the final, finishing his semi-final in sixth position. But in the race that counted he had what it took and raced into the lead with eight laps to go, UCI wrote.