Abu Dhabi: UAE's Asma clinches titlein 90-km endurance ride

Gulfnews.com

by M. Satya Narayan, Senior Reporter
December 26, 2009

Saudi Arabia's Latifa bags second place followed by Shamma



Abu Dhabi : Shaikha Asma Bint Taleb Al Qasimi, riding Kalkadoon Kampala, won the 90km Shaikh Hamdan Bin Rashid Al Maktoum Ladies Endurance Ride held yesterday at the Dubai International Endurance City.

The national ride, the first this season for ladies, was held under the patronage of Shaikh Hamdan Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Deputy Ruler of Dubai and Minister of Finance, who attended yesterday's event.

Shaikh Asma completed the 90km distance in a timing of 3 hours, 8 minutes and 21 seconds at an average speed of 28.67km/h to win from 42 other lady riders who started the ride.

Four stages

Saudi Arabia's Latifa Ahmad Al Shaikh and Shamma Al Mutawa from the UAE took the second and third places respectively. Latifa completed the ride in 3:14:22 while Shamma was timed at 3:21:06 for the race run in four stages of 31km, 29km, 18km and 12 km.

Yesterday's Ladies Ride was open to riders from the UAE, GCC nations and Arab residents in the UAE.

The 100km Shaikh Hamdan Bin Rashid Al Maktoum Challenge 1, a national ride, will be held today at the same venue, also under the patronage of Shaikh Hamdan.

The ride gets off to a mass start at 6am and will be run over four loops of 32km, 29km, 27km and 12km.