9
Bulls men and RE:CM ladies continue their Tankwa Dominance
Stage two of the Du Toit Tankwa Trek took the riders, down from the Kouebokkeveld into the Warmbokkeveld of the Ceres Valley and up the demanding climbs of the old Theronsberg Pass and the iconic Merino Monster. It was a 91km stage with featured 2 300m of vertical ascent.
Saturday morning dawned on the idyllic setting of Kaleo Manor, with the brief chaos of the thunderstorm and gale that blew briefly through the campsite for ten minutes on Friday evening long forgotten. The buzz on the start line was about the Du Toit Drop, the freshly cut single track designed to lead the field down to the Ceres Valley without needing to cross the busy Gydo Pass. Nearer the back of the group of assembled riders anxiously awaiting the starting gun, there was an unspoken challenge creating nervous tension, the 800m ascent over 8km of the Marino Monster.
Like on State One the racing started at a near frantic pace with the top teams and solo category contenders; Karl Platt, Urs Huber and Waylon Woolcock vying for position before the singe-track descent down the Du Toit Drop. The tight and steep switchbacks claimed an early victim with Darren Lill becoming the first, but certainly not the last, rider to crash making the descent. Lill was up and riding without any ill effects but his crash had separated Brendan Davids from his Trek Racing teammate James
If the pace was frantic before the drop, the Bulls riders cranked it up to a frenzy on the smooth farm roads leading to the first spectator point at Koelfontein Farm, inflicting lasting damage into Davids’s legs as he raced to re-join Reid with the leaders. From Koelfontein the route traced the Northern reaches of the Ceres Valley, before climbing up the old wagon trail of the Theronsberg Pass and back into the Kouebokkeveld.
The day was anything but cold though and the thermometer was soon edging towards 40⁰ Celsius. At water point three, on the Merino farm, at the foot of the Merino Monster the pace was being set by Huber and Platt, with James Reid looking strong with the Bulls solo riders but his partner Brendans Davids was looking less settled. Just behind the leading four riders came the Bulls team of Stiebjahn and Bohme looking to hunt down the Trek Racing team and claim the R30 000 King of the Mountain prize Wilde Fruit Juices had put on offer for the first team to crest the Monster.
In the heat of the exposed North facing slopes of the Merino Monster Davids wilted. Reid egged his partner on but he had to watch as first Huber rode away from them, then Platt followed and soon the Bulls team of Stiebjahn and Bohme passed them. Huber summited first, but with no prize money on offer his effort was solely to prove his Epic credentials for March. Stiebjahn and Bohme claimed the Wilde King of the Mountain purse with Reid and Davids summiting second in the team race.
In the ladies race it was once again a case of the RE:CM ladies, Ariane Kleinhans and Cherise Stander, racing the leading amateur men rather than their closest female competition. By the district roads leading up to the Merino Monster the RE:CM duo had opened a comfortable lead over the second placed pair of Ischen Stopforth and Yolande De Villiers of Sasol Racing and the Pragma's Orange Monkeys partnership of Mariske Strauss and Hanlie Booyens. They continued to build on their lead up the day’s major climb which allowed them to navigate the tricky descent from the crest of the Merino Monster at a safe pace.
In an awe-inspiringly short time Urs Huber was returning to the manicured lawns of Kaleo, this time riding in without Epic teammate Karl Platt. Huber finished the stage in a time of 3 hours 50 minutes and 33 seconds, 4 minutes and 37 seconds ahead of the Bulls team of Simon Stiebjahn and Tim Bohme, with Karl Platt coming in a further second back. The first local riders across the line were the Trek Racing team of Brendan Davids and James Reid who finished 9 minutes and 33 seconds down on the stage winners. The Fairview Elite Men, Adriaan Louw and Konny Looser were the third team in and Waylon Woolcock backed up his third place on Stage One with another third position in the solo men’s category.
In the ladies race the RE:CM girls extended their lead by a further 11 minutes over the Stopforth and De Villiers, while Strauss and Booyens were a further 7 minutes back. With an eye on the Epic in March it would appear that Frantisek Rabon is rather struggling with the transition from the road to the mountain, finishing 25 minutes and 4 seconds down on the stage winner on the day.
Stage 2: Race Report