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By APD writer Maverick
BALI, Feb. 3 (APD) — Bali would kickstart the 2018 Gran Fondo New York (GFNY) Global cycling Marathon Series on Sunday with over 1,400 cyclists from 30 nationalities have been registered to take part in the annual event, an co-organizer of the event said here on Saturday.
The race in Bali would make Indonesia hold GFNY series three times by this year, following the ones held in Bali’s neighboring island of Lombok in 2016 and 2017 respectively.
The 2016 GFNY Series in Lombok was the first to be held in Asian country.
GFNY Bali co-organizer Axel Moeller said that race in Bali would be divided in two groups, the Gran Fondo and Medio Fondo, which were designated for professional and amateur cyclists.
The Gran Fondo would take a route of 142 kilometers, while the Medio Fondo would take 80 kilometers, Moeller said.
Moeller added that routes for the Gran Fondo group would pass through complete tracks, comprised of coastal flat roads, mild upward and hilly tracks with challenging turns.
The most track highly expected by the professional cyclists would be the track around Batur volcano rim with Lake Batur in one side of the track, making it exceptionally different from other GFNY tracks in the world.
“We chose Bali because the island is very fascinating for the race, has a good and safe tracks along the routes,” Moeller told a press conference here.
The GFNY Bali would start and finish in Bali’s bustling coastal tourism area of Sanur, 30 minutes drive from the provincial capital of Denpasar.
Besides domestic cyclists, Moeller said cyclists taking part in GFNY Bali Series come from 30 countries and regions, among others from Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei, New Zealand, the United States, Canada, Australia, the Philippines, China, China’s Hong Kong, Japan, Germany, the Netherlands, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Switzerland, Italy, France, South Africa, Mexico, Thailand and Britain.
The top 10 percent of cyclists in all age groups would be qualified for a front corral start at the GFNY World Championship in NYC on May 20, 2018, Moeller added.
All routes used in GFNY Bali series would pass over 4 regencies, consisted of Sanur, Gianyar, Klungkung and Bangli.
Moeller said that Samosir island in Indonesia’s North Sumatra province landmark Lake Toba was already scheduled to host the GFNY Series in September this year.
The other GNFY series this year have been scheduled to be held in Uruguay, Costa Rica, Brazil, Germany, Portugal, Panama, Mexico and France, among others.
The conduction of sports tourism event in Bali was fully supported by Bali provincial authorities as it may recover foreign tourist arrivals, which have been drastically slowing down due to the Bali volcano eruption event in the last several months.
Indonesian authorities have declared Bali safe for tourism activities except areas identified as the dangerous areas, which now has been shrunken to 6 kilometers from Mount Agung volcano summit from the initial 10 kilometers.
Should the eruption takes place, the authorities said that areas possibly affected the volcano located in the northeastern part of Bali, was only 2 percent from overall Bali land.
The authorities have yet to downgrade the highest alert
status against the volcano which was imposed since November last year.
The volcano now seemed at peace with no significant volcanic activity has been taking place in the last few months.
(ASIA PACIFIC DAILY)
