The day finally arrived after more that a week’s wait for the first round of the UCI XCO series, kicking off at Cascades in Pietermaritzburg.
After arriving at the venue and watching an exciting end to the Elite women’s race that saw Canada’s Emily Batty (Subaru-Trek) narrowly miss out on her first World Cup win against Poland’s Maja Wloszczowska (CCC Polkowice), it was time to kit up and hit the warm up routine.
Once the warm up was finished it was time to get into the call up loading bay and wait for your name to be called to line up for the start. Being South African, and not having a high UCI seeding, this meant I was near the back, number 102! The tension before the race could be cut with a knife, as all the worlds best XC riders had come to show their stuff and claim glory. The minutes before the start are always the worst, as the anticipation is at an all time high as all the riders are lined up, with the thousands of spectators eagerly awaiting a show down.
The gun went off and as was expected, all hell broke loose as 120 of the worlds best riders hurtled down the start straight and into their first lap. The only thing you can do in this situation is go as fast as you can and look for gaps in the field to move up position. Soon though as per usual with world cups and starting at the back, I found myself waiting at the huge bottle necks which are typical of world cup racing. Once I had pushed and fought my way through that I was able to continue the all out sprint of the first lap.
Start straight
For me, lap two was where it almost fell apart as the efforts of lap 1 caught up with me. This was by far the hardest lap as I tried to catch my breath and settle into my own rhythm, all the while fighting the urge not to go too easy, the pain almost unbearable. I lost quite a few places on lap 2 but managed to hang on to the back of a big group of about 15 riders and let them do all the pace making. Some of these riders included the likes of Adam Craig, Woflram Kurschat and Mike Broderick.
As the race progressed I managed to get into my own rhythm and wasted no time in taking back places and making up time. Any hesitation at doing this at world cup level and you soon find yourself at the back and being pulled by the 80% rule. Lap by lap I rode hard and consistently, taking a few places each time, while not taking too many risks over the technical sections of the course. The amount of spectators around the course was amazing and really inspirational to hear your home crowd shout for you.
Home crowds
I kept up the hard efforts, especially on lap 5, and was rewarded for it by managing to make it onto the last lap without being pulled. For anyone who has started at the back of a world cup, you would know this is hard! Stoked with the opportunity I gave the last lap horns as I took back a few more places to finish just as a torrential downpour started to take 78th place, and 3rd African over the line.
Up ahead of me our very own Burry Stander(Specialized Factory Racing) had an epic battle with Switzerland’s Nino Schuter (Scott- Swisspower) but came out second best by a matter of seconds, and a minute up on Germany’s Manual Fumic (Cannondal Factory Racing).
Thoroughly stoked with my performance, there was no time to hang around as the torrential downpour quickly turned the roads into rivers, and soon everyone was soaked.
The next day however the sun was out shining and it was brilliant to watch another South African, Greg Minnaar set the downhill track on fire and take the win in front of an very loud and enthusiastic crowd. What a great weekend for South Africa!
So reflecting on the race I am very happy to finally produce a performance close to what I know I can produce, which I have battled to do over over the past few years. It is a great feeling to have ridden a a close to perfect race for me. I am really looking forward to the rest of the season to see what I can pull out of it! Also a big thanks must to to the Wolhuter family for hosting me while I was there, as well as my awesome sponsors RSA Web, Rocky Mountain, and of course Jesus Christ.
This weekend is my first weekend of no racing since the middle of January, looking forward to having some fun on the bike!
Until next time!
PS, someone conveniently complied a video with some crashes over the weekend, enjoy!
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