S

ome 200 mountain bike riders from Asia have signed up for the warm-up race of the 2015 Asian Enduro Series 2015 to be held in Puncak, a mountainous area to the south of Jakarta, this weekend.

Enduro differs from cross-country racing, which has more emphasis on cardiovascular fitness and less emphasis on technical ability. It is also different from pure downhill racing, which may contain little to no climbing or cross country skills.

Enduro'€™s '€œall mountain'€ discipline favors riders with a breadth of skills, on multi-discipline cycles.

The warm-up edition is a promotional event for 2016 Asian Enduro Series, which will be held in four series.

The organizers said that the event was expected to promote All Mountain disciplines to Indonesians as well as expose the beauty of the country'€™s natural cycling tracks to international enthusiasts. International participants come from the Philippines, Nepal, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore and Vietnam.

'€œBeing in the cycling community makes us aware that more and more avid riders in Indonesia are attracted to do All Mountain racing. Some of those riders practice regularly, [work on their] skills and endurance and even participate in few local Enduro races,'€ Apep Tata Wiryawan, person-in-charge of the KTH Bike Park, the race venue in Puncak, told a press conference on Thursday.

'€œAcknowledging such enthusiasm, we, at the KTH Bike Park, are committed to organize an Asian-level competition to encourage and to give an adrenaline rush to the All Mountain riders in the country to step forward, exposing their skills and competing with riders from overseas.

'€œI'€™m optimistic that this weekend'€™s event will be a perfect gathering for All Mountain riders,'€ said Apep Tata.

In the weekend race of three stages, the riders are offered with seven classes: men'€™s elite, men open, junior, master A, master B, master C and women. The organizers, who look up to Enduro World Series (EWS), will apply a Near Field Communication (NFC) based timing system to avoid possible technical errors.

'€œThe NFC based system is considered as new technology in cycling races. We were introduced to the technology by fellow Malaysian riders,'€ Apep told The Jakarta Post.

The event'€™s promoter Ical Hardiyana said that besides promoting the All Mountain discipline, the warm-up event also played a part as an important milestone to form an Asian federation for the discipline.

'€œCurrently, we are looking to EWS for the regulation. Our plan is to set up Asia'€™s own federation by 2016. [The upcoming federation] is planned to be at the same level with EWS, which mostly holds events in European and Latin American countries,'€ he said.

Rider Joyce del Socorro of the Philippines said that she was looking forward to racing at Puncak race track.

'€œDoing the All Mountain cycling is simply good to shape up your basic cycling skills and endurance. It also gives you chance to mingle with other riders, besides enjoying the track,'€ said Socorro.