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Victor
Espiritu and Irish Valenzuela will head the national road
cycling team that will vie in the Polygon Tour de Jakarta
in Jakarta, Indonesia, on March 23.
Espiritu
and Valenzuela will be joined by Lloyd Lucien Reynante, Ronald
Gorrantes and Warren Davadilla in the one-day, 170-km race
that will feature other national squads from the Asian and
Southeast Asian regions, as well as continental teams from
Europe.
The
RP riders are actually the same team which topped the Tour
of Thailand last December. It was the first time that a Philippine
road team won a multi-stage competition abroad.
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Seventeen
teams, including those from Europe, participated in
Thailand, but that RP squad, coached by Jomel Lorenzo
with Renato Dolosa and Dindo Quirimit as assistants
and Dante Valdes as equipment custodian, emerged overall
team champion, beating a powerhouse Japanese continental
squad.
That
performance got the attention of the Asian cycling community
that the Indonesian Cycling Federation, through its
Secretary General Sofian Ruzlan, was specific about
its invitation to the same squad that won in Thailand
for the Polygon Tour de Jakarta.
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Also,
Valenzuela, only 20 years old, has gotten invitations from
continental teams from Indonesia and Denmark to race for them,
but the Indonesian PMCM CCN Dodol Picnic has beaten the Danes
to the draw and are close to signing Valenzuela.
Meanwhile,
the PhilCycling, through its president Bert Lina, is expected
to re-establish the national team soon, but unlike in the
past, the squad will have emphasis on youth.
Riders
primarily in the under-23 bracket are being eyed to replenish
the national team and pool because of the PhilCycling's focus
on the 2012 London Olympics. No Filipino has raced in the
Olympics since the Union Cycliste Internationale has imposed
qualifying standards for the Games.
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