Taiwan Cup cancelled due to Typhoon Megi

Due to torrential rains brought by Typhoon Megi, all of the Taiwan Cycling Festival events including the Taiwan Cup have been cancelled. Top professional cyclists Oscar Freire, Robert Hunter, Tadej Valjavec and David Tanner had made their way to Taipei for the week-end.

Heavy downpours have caused damage to thirteen schools and the course of Sunday’s 210-km race along the provincial highway no.9 and highway no.11 with the views of mountain scenes of the East Rift Valley and the seaside sceneries of the Pacific Ocean has been affected as well.

Max Lin, the team manager of Taiwan Action Cycling team said: “We have to respect the race organization’s decision and the organization had really made lots of effort to hold the Taiwan Cup; it’s a natural disaster and nobody could predict or prevent it, for a
cycling event, safety is always the first priority”, said Lin.

This was Freire’s first time in Taiwan. The recent winner of Paris-Tours met with honorable officials and VIPs including MOTC Minister Mao, director-general of the Tourism Bureau Janice Lai, TRA director-general Frank Fan, the chairman of Cycling Life-Style Foundation also the founder of Giant bicycle company King Liu.

He said he was “looking forward to race in beautiful Eastern Taiwan” in the country of his bike supplier but he’ll take part in a fun ride in Taipei on Sunday instead of racing the Taiwan Cup.