Thai sprinters raced out of their skins to spring a surprise at the Track Asia Cup 2026, lifting the Kingdom to fourth spot in the continental rankings — but there was little time to savour the achievement, with the 2026 Asian Games in Aichi-Nagoya bearing down fast.
It was Jai Angsuthasawit who wrote the headline chapter of Thailand’s success story, claiming three gold medals — in the keirin, individual sprint and team sprint — at the three-day Asian meet, which wrapped up in Bangkok on Aug 30.
Jai was not the only Thai rider to shine. Jutatip Maneephan took silver in the women’s omnium, Norasetthada Bunma added a bronze in the keirin, and the women’s team sprint trio of Aphitsara Srimongkhon, Natthaporn Aphimote and Kawinnad Kherthong claimed bronze of their own, rounding out a haul of three golds, one silver and two bronzes for the host nation.
There was barely time to draw breath. After just a single day’s rest, the quartet of Jai, Norasetthada, Yuenyong Phetcharat and Jutathip were back on a plane, this time bound for Tianjin in China, to acclimatise to 250-metre indoor track conditions.
From there, it is on to Japan for the final stretch of preparation before the track cycling programme gets under way at the Izu Velodrome in Shizuoka, running from Sept 29 to Oct 2.
Despite the gold-medal haul in Bangkok, Thailand’s team sprint unit remains 15th in the latest UCI world rankings, released recently, with 1,950 points — the maximum 300 points earned at the Track Asia Cup were not enough to leapfrog Colombia, who also picked up ranking points from competition in the Americas over the same period and climbed to 12th in the world, above Trinidad and Tobago and China.
In Asia, however, Thailand moved up from fifth to fourth.
Japan lead the continental standings with 2,910 points, good for eighth in the world, ahead of Kazakhstan (2,235 points, 10th globally) and China (2,070 points, third in Asia) — just 120 points above Thailand. India sit fifth in Asia with 1,710 points, followed by Malaysia in sixth on 1,620.
General Decha Hemkrasri, deputy president of the Asian Cycling Confederation and president of the Thailand Cycling Association, said the team sprint trio — Jai, Norasetthada and Yuenyong — stood a strong chance of qualifying for the UCI Tissot Track World Championships in Shanghai from Oct 14-18.
Jai has climbed from 48th to 45th in the latest world sprint rankings.
Gen Decha added that although the trio’s times in Bangkok fell short of their form at the 33rd SEA Games on home soil, that was largely because the team had been based in Tianjin for weeks, training specifically on a 250-metre track to prepare for the Asian Games format.
He said Thailand’s times across the Asian Track Championships in the Philippines and two Track World Cup legs, in Hong Kong and Malaysia, had hovered around 44 seconds — with a best of 44.226 — while riding ageing frames and wheels.
New equipment has since been ordered for Nagoya, and General Decha said he was confident the trio could dip into the 43-second range, putting them in medal contention against favourites China, Japan, Hong Kong and Malaysia.