By Rawle Toney in Suriname
Guyana’s male and female cyclists were at the end of dubious officiating as the cycling events got underway yesterday with the team Time Trials which marked the beginning of the Inter Guiana Games (IGG) cycling championships.
The men’s team (Geron Williams, Christopher Holder, Chris Persaud and Enzo Mathews) were all brimming with confidence prior to the start of the event and clocked 14 minutes, 57.29 seconds.
“I want to see them beat that,” said team captain Geron Williams. When the Surinamese riders took the road, they were behind Guyana on time Guyana (2’:55”) after the first lap where they clocked some three minutes and two seconds.
Subsequently, however, the pace car began driving very close to the riders and as such assisted in lowering the times by cutting the tail wind.
“That is not fair to do,” uttered the team’s manager, Dr. Karen Pilgrim and the Guyanese supporters also joined in the cry.
Nevertheless, the Surinamese allowed the vehicle to continue to travel very close to the cyclists and the Dutch riders finished with a time of 14 minutes, 44.74 seconds while French Guiana was third with 15 minutes, 47.84 seconds.
“This is bull-….,” said Director of Sports, Neil Kumar, as he queried whether the action was legal.
Subsequently, a protest was lodged by the Guyanese but at time of this report the outcome of the protest was not known.
“I know for a fact we ride the fastest,” said Williams, adding… “with the times we did, they had to be real big-time professional cyclists to beat that. First thing they would have to do like 35-40 mph on the straight and the world see how slow they were…is just robbery.”
It was the first time cycling was being added as an official IGG competition with only the males going for points. The biggest disappointment came in the female category with Guyana’s two representatives, Naomi Singh and Marica Dick outclassing their Dutch and French counterparts.
Ideally they were first and second with Singh having the fastest time and Dick the second fastest but the officials said that they both failed to ride the complete course and awarded the first two places to the Surinamese and French Guiana cyclists.
This immediately brought tears to the eyes of the two Guyanese cyclists and Dr. Pilgrim and other members of the delegation once again asked about the decision but was told that the two cyclists did not go fully around the round-about which was part of the course but had cut short.
“I did not! I went the right direction all the time, “ exclaimed Dick as she explained that she was just following the other cyclists who were in front of her.
Singh said the same thing.
Eventually the first place remained with the Surinamese while Dick was given second place.
Singh was disqualified since the authorities were not convinced that she did the course in its entirety.
The 60K road race was scheduled for yesterday afternoon.
