Alena Reji (born 9 May 1999) is an Indian cyclist who specializes in

track cycling Track cycling is a bicycle racing sport usually held on specially built banked tracks or velodromes using purpose-designed track bicycles. History Track cycling has been around since at least 1870. When track cycling was in its infancy, it wa ...

. She comes from

Thiruvambady Thiruvambady is a major hill town and a suburb in southeastern Kozhikode district in Kerala, India. Thiruvambady is a Panchayat headquarters, and a legislative assembly constituency, situated from the district headquarters of Kozhikode. Geog ...

Kerala Kerala ( ; ) is a state on the Malabar Coast of India. It was formed on 1 November 1956, following the passage of the States Reorganisation Act, by combining Malayalam-speaking regions of the erstwhile regions of Cochin, Malabar, South ...

Early life

Reji is the daughter of Reji Cherian and was gifted a cycle to save time while going to school.

Career

At the age of 12, Reji was selected by the Kerala State Sports Council (KSSC) and moved to

Thiruvananthapuram Thiruvananthapuram (; ), also known by its former name Trivandrum (), is the capital of the Indian state of Kerala. It is the most populous city in Kerala with a population of 957,730 as of 2011. The encompassing urban agglomeration populati ...

. Chandran Chettiar from KSSC is her coach. In the 37th Asia Track cycling championship 2017, Reji bagged a bronze medal in the 500m time trial in the junior women category. This medal was the second for

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

in the sport. In the Track Asia Cup 2016, Reji won a silver beating Jantuganova Olga from

Uzbekistan Uzbekistan (, ; uz, Ozbekiston, italic=yes / , ; russian: Узбекистан), officially the Republic of Uzbekistan ( uz, Ozbekiston Respublikasi, italic=yes / ; russian: Республика Узбекистан), is a doubly landlocked cou ...

. Reji was also selected to participate in the 38th Senior Asian Track Championship held in Malaysia in 2018. She clocked 34.845 seconds and finished 6th failing to qualify. The best 4 made it the next round. She was nominated for the

2018 UCI Track Cycling World Championships The 2018 UCI Track Cycling World Championships were the World Championships for track cycling in 2018. They took place in the Netherlands at the Omnisport Apeldoorn from 28 February to 4 March 2018. Schedule The schedule of events was as follows ...

in Apeldoorn , where she went with

Deborah Herold Deborah Herold (born 18 February 1995 in Aberdeen, Andaman and Nicobar Islands) is an Indian cyclist. Early life and education Herold is an ethnic Nicobarese. She grew up in Car Nicobar, where her father served as an Air Force officer. She wa ...

in the team sprint at the start. The duo finished last.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Reji, Alena Indian female cyclists Indian sportswomen Living people 1999 births People from Kozhikode district Sportswomen from Kerala 21st-century Indian women 21st-century Indian people Cyclists at the 2018 Asian Games Asian Games competitors for India