gtr1

Only problem is it is usually a head wind when cycling home after the race. And that hurts more :-(

Wind is good. Makes for good hard racing.

Hoekvlag, I agree that your date is fairly set, but 1 week earlier there was not a race to be found. That would help with numbers. Calender always hard to work with.

Another great cyclist never really heard of. Got to wonder how many of his past results and contracts were based on a lie ???

Nice fast race. Route was enjoyable. Wind not so much. Bad weekend to chose. Garmin race, Sun city, gravel express.

What is route like for the 60 k ?

I'm interested and available for the inter- provincial :-)

Was a good race. First time I've done it. Will do it again. Well organised. Enjoyed the route. Good result. And nice fast racing when they combined VA, VB and VC. does make it tricky watching the guys you are actually racing. Pity it was not supported as well as other events.

No number printing. Was in and out in 5 minutes. Not busy at all this morning.

Ridden them. Very safe. Pity they tarred the section from the Bird of Prey centre to golf course. Some nice climbing. Can also ride along the railway line.

Gerryonimo, be thankful you received prize money. This race has some of the better prizes. I have had 2ndand 3rds in some of the top mtb series and not even covered entry. We don't do it for the money. Try horse riding. My daughter does a school show. Costs around R700-R 1000 for the day depending on classes, and she can win some rosettes. But it is healthy, keeps her out of the malls, teaches her responsibility. She gas a sense of pride and achievement. Worth more than some prize money.

At what point do e-bikes become unrecognizable as such, and move into the realms of mechanical doping. Coz trust me, guys will do that, if not already. Then becomes a larger policing issue.

Sounds like a typical weather forecast.............WRONG ;-)

Maybe Willie burnt some bridges.

Easy decision. Organizers still make a huge profit without the event even taking place. So they win, everyone else loses.

Great report. Glad I was standing on the sidelines watching it all unfold. As he said......it was brutal.

The funny thing is, when you are there and ready to race, all you think is, ****, I better drink more than I normally do and stay well hydrated. Was never a thought of not riding or requesting the race to be shortened etc.

The official temp was around 38 or 40 on Friday. But was measured at 55 on a Garmin bike computer in the sun !! Damn hot either way. And then throw in wind !!!!!

I dont want to take anything away from the incident involving the crash, but there are some realities we have to face. As well as giving credit where it is due. To have full road closure for an event that covers 5 days is impossible. No matter where you have it. The only way you can mitigate this is to have separate road and tt events, and to even split race categories. As CSA is trying to accommodate all age categories. Which is great to promote the sport. Also logistically difficult as parents and children all compete. So 1 event is much better for logistics and costs for CSA and riders. Having said that, other than the incident mentioned, I have not heard of any other incidents over the 5 days, and many categories. You need to realise there were multiple categories racing at the same time and different start times covering a day. So a full days racing every day. Impossible to close roads. I raced and trained around the circuit and seconded on the final day. Loved the fact that we could all race over the entire road. Always had traffic officers, motorbike marshalls etc ensuring rolling road closure. Especially when the wind was up and gutters were aplenty. At the start/finish, half the road was completely blocked from traffic for the sprint. And Traffic officers were controlling the flow of traffic onto the course and off it. As a route there were essentially only 3 access roads to the circuit and were all managed. Also had marshalls sitting at most, if not all, major entrances to the circuit from farms and businesses. Problem is one can never control irritated motorists, but on a whole I never witnessed that. So not saying anything perfect, but I believe it was a well run event with great racing on a tough circuit (if the wind blew) So credit to CSA for that and all the traffic officers marshalls etc. As for the weather. It was damn hot, and the 60+ and 70+ and youth and para categories suffered getting those conditions. Should they have been cancelled........probably. but a logistic nightmare how to accommodate that into the program. And I doubt whatever they did would have had any positive response either. I do believe as mentioned that CSA should take up the fight on behalf of the cyclist with the truck involved in the incident. But I don't think we can blame them for everything that happens, and they deserve credit when they do put on a good event. Problem on The Hub is ( and it's not Friday yet), everyone quick to criticize, but very few willing to put up their hand to assist to manage and get involved in the managing of events etc. And slow to give credit

Not possible because you get a penalty if accepting outside assistance. That is in terms of mechanicals from anyone not registered as a support team. Men may have helped pacing, but the that helps all ladies. That changed a lot last year with a seperate start batch.

It is the athletes responsibility. No need for Google. Drug free sport has an app that if you type in the commercial name it well tell you if banned or not. Takes a minute. So no excuses !!

Seen some markups on bikes and about 50%. Give or take a bit of rounding. R123k to LBS and recommended retail R180k

What property does the zinc-oxide provide. Used in sun screens ?

FiT chamois cream. Half the price !! And way better :-)

Intent or negligence is very different to proven innocence or unintentional through contamination. Which still ends to be proved.