LAHORE, May 19: The 12th Tour de Pakistan International cycle race, offering cash prizes worth Rs 1 million will be held from Quetta to Peshawar from Dec 18 to 30.
This was disclosed by the Pakistan Cycling Federation (PCF) secretary Idris Haider Khawaja while unfolding the activity programme for 2004 on Wednesday.
"The federation is in a position to pay Rs 1 million as cash prize for the top three position holders, but we are trying to increase the amount to US$100,000", the secretary said.
The race would start from Quetta instead of Karachi in order to include all the four provinces in the route. The race will enter Sindh at Sukkur. Except in 1995, the race had always started from Mazar-i- Quaid Karachi missing Balochistan.
"The roads condition in Balochistan have been improved remarkably therefore the federation sees no such problem in starting the race from Quetta", he said. Invitations were being extended to India, Bangladesh, Saudi Arabia, Iran and UAE to send their cyclists to participate in the race and the PCF hoped the big cash prize would attract more cyclists from abroad.
Idris claimed that despite the stoppage of the grants fromthe Pakistan Sports Board (PSB) the federation has been completing its calendar of activity, successfully and believed the federation's performance had improved after the stoppage of annual grant.
He said that PCF had sent two teams abroad this year and had also organised two competitions at home. Six cyclists participated in the Tour de Sri Lanka while another six were in Iran to take part in the Tour de Azerbaijan (Iran).
He said that besides the Tour de Pakistan, eight more events would be held this year. The number of activity could be increased if the Indian and the Pakistan governments granted permission to the Peace Race from Islamabad to New Delhi or vice versa to be jointly organised by the two national federations.
He said that the National Velodrome would be renovated by the PSB for which the approval had been granted.
2004 events:
June 20: 50 KMs Road Race in Lahore.
July 25: 50 KMS Road Race in Lahore.
Aug 14: Road Race from Hyderabad to Karachi.
Sept-Oct: Participation in 29th National Games in Quetta.
Oct 10: Champion of Hills Cycle Race (Rawalpindi to Murree).
Nov 9 : Allama Iqbal Day Race from Allama Iqbal House Sialkot to Mazar-e-Allama Iqbal Lahore.
Nov 26-30: 53rd National Cycling Championship in Lahore.
Dec 5-11: Participation in Combined Indo-Pak Punjab Games at Patiala (India).
Dec 18-30: 12th Tour de Pakistan International Race. Cycling events on national days will be arranged by the provincial associations.
