Morales restamps class as sprint specialist

PALAYAN CITY, Nueva Ecija , Philippines —If there was a doubt about Jan Paul Morales being the best Filipino sprinter today, the two-time LBC Ronda Pilipinas champion quashed it yesterday.

Morales, 34, gave his chief rivals and the young generation of riders a sprint clinic as he topped the relatively flat Stage Seven in the Ronda 10th anniversary race.

The 2016 and 2017 Ronda king edged Dominic Perez of Bicycology-Army and Rustom Lim of 7Eleven Cliqq-Air21 by Roadbike Philippines in a mad dash to the finish before an appreciative crowd headed by host Mayor Adrianne Mae Cuevas.

It was the second straight lap victory for Morales, who clocked two hours, 35 minutes and 20 seconds – along with the rest of the riders in the peloton – in a follow-up to his Stage Six triumph in Tarlac in this 10-stage race presented by LBC and backed by the Manny V. Pangilinan Sports Foundation.

For the Standard Insurance-Navy riders, it’s the fourth stage top honors counting Ronald Lomotos’ win in Stage Four in Lucena and John Mark Camingao’s victory in Stage Five in Antipolo.

And the feat kept the Calumpang-based Morales on top of the CCN sprint race, underscoring his status as the country’s best sprinter.

“I lost count,” said Morales in Filipino when asked how many stages and sprint titles has he won.

The mass finish also enabled another Standard bet George Oconer to keep his stranglehold of the individual general classification lead with an aggregate clocking of 23:04:31.

Trailing the 28-year-old Oconer, son of two-time Olympian Norberto, were teammates Ronald Oranza (23:05:46), Lomotos (23:05:49), Camingao (23:06:24), Junrey Navarra (23:06:48) and El Joshua Carino (23:08:22).

Mark Julius Bordeos of Bicycology (23:09:45), Rustom Lim of 7Eleven (23:09:47) and Go for Gold’s Jonel Carcueva (23:09:59) and Ismael Grospe, Jr. (23:10:19) were the other riders in the Top 10.