Muhammad Raihaan Abd Aziz was the country's best rider in Myanmar after finishing third in the pre-Southeast Asian (SEA) Games cycling competition on Friday.

The 25-year-old clocked a time of one hour and 12 minutes in the 50km individual event in Naypyidaw.

Brunei also finished third when a team of Reduan Yusop, I'maadi Aziz, Rifa'ie Johor, Loqman Hadzid, Syazwi Hairolrani recorded a time of 3 hours and 55 minutes in the Road Race Team event.

"I am very happy with my time. It always feels good to finish in the top three even though it was very windy and the road surface was very rough in Myanmar," said Muhammad Raihaan in an interview with The Brunei Times yesterday.

Raihaan views the pre-SEA Games race as a serious part of his training programme, as well as an opportunity to be selected for the SEA Games in December, his main target.

"The real race will be in December.

"We are training hard to earn a place in the Brunei team to SEA Games.

"We will continue to train, and the next stop for us will be at the Metro XC Putrajaya Challenge in Kuala Lumpur on June 2," he added.

Mohd Raihaan was not in the earlier pre-SEA Games cycling competition in March in Myanmar because of a visa problem, leaving Mohd Nurjamri Johari as the only Bruneian in the competition.

He finished ninth out of the 10 competitors in the cross-country event after suffering from technical problems that ended his race prematurely.

Last month, Mohd Nurjamri, riding under the banner of Endurace cycling team, finished in 26th position out of 127 riders at the MTB Huangshan 2013 in China. He clocked a time of one hour and 59 minutes in the 40-kilometre first stage and completed the 80km second stage with at time of four hours and 32mins which saw him slip two places. National cycling coach Yafiz Jamaludin has 10 cyclists shortlisted for the SEA Games, six for the road race event, two for cross-country and two for downhill.

Mohd Nurjamri and Muhammad Raihaan will race in the cross country event.

Reduan, I'maadi, Rifa'ie, Loqman, Syazwi and Nazri Mastani will make up the road race team, while, Azizi Kamal and Shahnizzam Hj Tamit will compete for Brunei in the downhill event.

Courtesy from Brunei Times