Dormant Jelajah Malaysia faces bleak future

New Straits Times

5 days ago

KUALA LUMPUR: The future of Jelajah Malaysia — the country's oldest cycling stage race — as a UCI event remains very much in doubt.
That is the view of Malaysia National Cycling Federation (MNCF) secretary Arif Astaman who admitted that it would be very difficult for any organiser to take on the event and expect to turn a profit.
The tour — first held in 1963 — was last run in 2017 as a UCI 2.2 level event.
An organiser did attempt to revive the race in 2023, however, cancelled the event after postponing it multiple times due to a lack of funding.
"I think it is going to be very tough to make Jelajah Malaysia profitable as a UCI2.2 race," said Arif when met recently.
"With Jelajah, you don't have the same calibre of riders and teams as Le Tour de Langkawi (LTdL) so you can't really offer sponsors the same kind of value.
"But the costs to organise the race are not that much different as you still have to meet UCI standards.
"This means you still have to permanently shut down roads during the event, provide hotel rooms, transportation, fuel, prize money, staging as well as sanctioning fees to the UCI.
"It is tough for races like Jelajah to be in the black because we do not have domestic companies (sponsors) who have that kind of money to spend where the link to sales is not immediate.
"Personally, I feel that the future of Jelajah as a UCI race remains very much in doubt. I do, however, believe it can be run successfully as a domestic race."
Arif said a number of local stage races such as Tour Gateh D'Tranung, Jelajah Negri Sembilan and Tour Geo D'Kedah have proven that it is possible to run stage races sustainably at the domestic level.
"Local races run under MNCF rules, which means tour organisers can ask teams to bring their own (team) cars, can place teams in hostels or just give them money to sort out their own accommodation," said Arif.
"MNCF also does not set any required standard for prize money. These savings makes the costs of organsing the event much more manageable for the organisers.
"The Tour Gateh D'Tranung for example, has done really well over the past few years and is now a seven or eight stage race.
"I believe very much in development and we need races in which our young riders can learn to ride in a peloton. You can't replicate that in training.
"If you combine the stages from the three local tours we probably have about 14 to 15 days of racing a year for our local riders.
"It would be great if we could increase that to somewhere between 20 to 30 days a year. That would be fantastic.
"The challenge for organisers who want to run Jelajah as a domestic event is again to find a suitable sponsor. With its name being Jelajah Malaysia, you cannot just hold it in one state."