Malaysia steals the show in Beijing

By Laura Weislo

The Malaysian team showed that it has become truly world class by scoring double golds on the second day of competition at the Beijing World Cup. A day after suffering the disappointment of missing out on the finals of the men's team sprint, the big-legged boys from Southeast Asia rallied to win the men's kilometre time trial, which went to 24-year-old Rizal Tisin of Malaysia, and the keirin with Azizul Hasni Awang.

Awang, who won the keirin at the Melbourne World Cup, now sits atop the World Cup rankings with four points over Frenchman François Pervis. Pervis did not contest the keirin, and instead took part in the kilo where he took second place to Tisin.

The victory of Tisin would have been no surprise - he did set a new Asian record at the Victorian championships in Australia last month - had he not suffered a crash while training on his road bike last week. The New Straits Times reported that Tisin injured his hand in the wreck and had trouble pulling up on the bars.

Tisin did not come close to matching the 1:02.095 he set in Australia, but the 1:02.268 was good enough for gold by nearly four tenths of a second over Pervis. Poland's Kamil Kuczynski took bronze over World Cup leader Wen Hao Li (China).

Continue to the full coverage of the Beijing World Cup.