Tokyo Olympics: Hong Kong camp on edge as Sarah Lee squeaks through to third round in sprint – ‘it was a bit scary’
- The 34-year-old Lee has to come through the repechage to advance from round of 16 and keep hopes alive
- Lee will take on 22-year-old Mathilde Gros, of France, in her heat on Saturday
The 34-year-old was forced to dig deep again at the Izu Velodrome to keep her medal dreams alive. Just as she had to in the keirin event on Thursday, Lee was made to come through a last-16 repechage to secure her path to the next round. She comfortably beat USA’s Madalyn Godby to ensure her involvement into the weekend.
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Gold medals galore for China at Olympics as athletes struggle with stifling heat in Tokyo
Earlier in the day, Lee qualified ninth fastest, before easing past Lithuanian veteran Simona Krupeckaite to advance from the round of 32.
She was handed a far trickier assignment in her last-16 heat and was narrowly beaten by Great Britain’s Katy Marchant, the Rio 2016 bronze medallist. But Hong Kong’s London 2012 bronze medallist in the keirin was given a repechage opportunity 20 minutes later and she made no mistake against Godby, who had already required a repechage to make it into the third round.
“The result is not unacceptable as Lee still made it through, although her progress was a bit scary,” said cycling team manager Chan Kwok-ki.
“The racing is very competitive as we can see from the qualifiers. Since proper international races have been suspended for a long time due to the pandemic, many of the riders were forced to stay home for training without knowing the progress of their competitors. And we were able to find out a lot more today.