Furuya recorded a time of 1 hour, 49 minutes, and 43 seconds to be ranked first. The silver medal went to Ayan Beisenbayev from Kazakhstan, with a time difference of 0.55 seconds longer, while the bronze was won by Mingxu Li from China, with a difference of 1.06 minutes.
Meanwhile, Indonesian athlete Muhammad Ahlul Firman was ranked 13th, with a time of 1 hour, 56.02 minutes, or 6.19 minutes longer than the gold medalist.
The gold winner Jumpei Furuya expressed happiness on winning a gold medal at the 2018 Asian Games. Several people had, in fact, predicted the victory of the 27-year-old athlete, as he has experience competing in the Jakabaring triathlon.
In 2017, Furuya won a gold medal in the Asian Triathlon Championship held in Palembang.
"I am happy to win the gold medal, as (AG 2018) is an important championship for me. Hence, I really laud the coach, staff, and all those who always support me," he noted.
Furuya, in fact, did not start the race well enough in the swimming session. He recorded a time of 18.48 minutes and was ranked second, behind Makato Odakura, who was also from Japan, with a time difference of 0.01 seconds.
However, Furuya was faster while transitioning from swimming to bicycle, so he overtook his compatriot.
During the bicycle session, he continued to race at number 1, with a record of 1 hour, 15 minutes, and 50 seconds.
The time record is the same as that achieved by South Korean athlete, Ji Hwan Kim. However, Kim was unable to catch up with Furuya and suffered an injury during a run session, so he failed to finish.
Furuya progressed during the running session, with a time of 33.33 minutes on four laps.
Furuya said he had intentionally saved energy at the start of the race in the swimming session and began to increase speed while transitioning from swimming to bicycle.
"My next target is the triathlon championship in Tokyo in preparation for the Tokyo 2020 Olympics. My target is gold," he stated.
This is the second gold medal for Japan from triathlon. The day before, Japanese athlete Yuko Takahashi had won a gold medal in the elite women`s triathlon.
Reporting by FB Anggoro
Reporter: Antara
Editor: Otniel Tamindael
Copyright © ANTARA 2018
