Hong Kong’s Sarah Lee sends Olympic warning with dominant sprint gold in Japan Cup
- Lee easily defeats potential Olympic rival Morton Stephanie, of Australia, in the final
- The Hong Kong cycling team are in Izu Peninsula for a fact-finding trip ahead of next year’s Tokyo Games
Hong Kong’s Sarah Lee Wai-sze sounded another warning to her Olympic rivals after capturing gold in the women’s sprint at the Japan Cup, a timely rehearsal for next year’s Tokyo Games.
With 11 months left to the sporting extravaganza, Lee competed against the world’s top sprinters, all of whom were on a fact-finding trip to Izu Peninsula where the Olympic track cycling events will take place. Izu, of Shizuko prefecture, is about a two-hour drive south of Tokyo.
And the Hong Kong rider, who clinched the sprint and keirin world titles earlier this year, showed no mercy to her opponents.
She topped the 200 metre qualifiers in a time of 10.638 seconds, just a little shy of her Asian record of 10.571 before going all the way through to the final where she outclassed Stephanie Morton, of Australia, for the gold.
Lee won the best-of-three tie 2-0 as she repeated her victory overthe Australian rider from the world championships in Poland in March. Veteran Simona Krupeckaite, of Lithuania, won the bronze after overcoming 2016 Rio Olympic bronze medallist Katy Marchant, of England.
