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LTdL Stage 3: Panaria Take Charge

There was a spirited Malaysian performance, but again it was an all-Panaria show at the finish line when Ruben Bongiorno pipped Greame Brown to bag Stage Two of the Telekom Malaysia Le Tour de Langkawi (LTdL) yesterday.

For more than 100 kilometres, Ahmad Fallanie Ali had launched a breakaway with Bridgestone Anchor's Takashi Miyazawa from the 10km point of the 171.6km route from Kangar to Kepala Batas.

And it was only inside the final 20km that the two were caught with a strong charge from the Italian Panaria outfit leading the peloton into the second bunch sprint of the Tour.

It was again Bongiorno and Brown having a go, but the Argentine this time managed to turn the tables on the Australian Stage One winner with a lunge at the line and Brown seemed to realise that he hadn't enough to take his second stage win in a row.

The yellow jersey, however, remained on Brown although Bongiorno has now cut that lead to just one second, while he still kept the blue jersey as the points leader by default, because Brown still holds the yellow one.

Fallanie, 21, was the best Malaysian performer of the day, bagging full points in the King of the Mountains (KOM) point at Bukit Selambau, while finishing second to Miyazawa in all three sprints at the Alor Star Tower, Gurun and Padang Serai.

The good show by Fallanie was however met with a downside to the Malaysian presence when Musairi Musa and Raziff Jaafar, both suffering from possible food poisoning, failed to finish and were eliminated from the race.

Kepala Batas 30/01/2005