Santia dedicates cycling to late grandmother
Musthofid, The Jakarta Post, Hanoi
"I'm really happy that I could win a gold medal for the country. I'd love to present the victory to my late grandma," said 22-year old cyclist Santia Tri Kusuma of Indonesia.
Santia, winner of the 30.6-kilometer criterium race earlier in the games, edged Thailand's Monrudee Chapookam by 0.72 seconds for a gold medal in the 90-kilometer mass start event on Tuesday.
She finished in 2 hours, 24 minutes, 46.34 seconds on roads in Hoa Binh, 76 km southwest of Hanoi.
Santia's success in Sunday's Criterium was only a few days shy of the 1,000th day anniversary of her grandmother's death. Even with her victory, she still felt sad that she could not observe the 1,000th day ritual, as it is known among the Indonesian Muslim community, as she was busy making her final preparations for the SEA Games.
"I wish I could have gone home two weeks before my departure. But I couldn't. Grandma was close to me. She knew my sport and always wished me luck whenever I was about to leave for competitions," she told The Jakarta Post on the sidelines of the Individual Time Trial (ITT) on Sunday in Bac Ninh province.
Santia said her brother Priyo Susanto, also a member of the cycling delegation to Hanoi, was the one who had lured her into the world of cycling.
She first tried Mountain Bike (MTB), and won a silver medal in the 1997 SEA Games in Jakarta. Bad luck laid her effort to waste in Brunei the following two years, sidelining her with a flat tire.
She switched from MTB to track riding, and in her first SEA Games in the event, she bagged a gold medal in Kuala Lumpur. She kept her winning form in the Elimination event in Thailand's Asian Championships in 2002, and at the 2002 Asian Games in Busan, she claimed a bronze.
"I'm curious about continuing to a higher level. My obsession is to make it to the Olympics," said the Malang-born cyclist.
Looking ahead at possible sporting careers when she retires as an athlete, Santia said she would like to coach.
"I want to help Indonesian cycling deliver a better performance in the future."