Azizulhasni Awang and Shah Firdaus Sahrom had to do it the hard way to reach the men's sprint 1/8 finals at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics as they went through two repecharge rounds.

After qualifying from the preliminary round, the Malaysian cyclists were paired with six-time Olympic gold medalist Jason Kenny and six-time world champion Harrie Lavreysen respectively in the first elimination round.

They lost their respective showdowns but stayed in the competition by surviving the first repecharge round.

In the following round, Azizulhasni lost narrowly to Nicholas Paul, who holds the world record with 9.100s, while Shah Firdaus couldn't outrace Tokyo 2020 silver medalist Jack Carlin, forcing them to go through another repechage round.

Azizulhasni had no problems dispatching of Canada's Nick Wammes to book a meeting tomorrow with four-time world champion Jeffrey Hoogland, who already won a gold medal in the team sprint event.

As for Shah Firdaus, a collision with Polish opponent Patryk Rajkowski delayed his repechage before coming out on top, setting up a rematch with Lavreysen.

(Photo: asiana.my)