"What are you doing here? You not a student..."
That was the reaction I got from many of the guys at the opening function at Primi in Paarl on Monday night making me feel very old at the age of 27. Just because I managed to find myself a beautiful woman and get married to her doesn't mean I'm old! I'm a registered full-time student at the University of Cape Town (UCT) in my second and final year of completing a Masters Degree in Atmospheric Science. Currently I'm in the think of writing up 18 months worth of research on extreme rainfall synoptics in South Africa into one big thesis that is due on 10 September!
Anyways, enough of the academic talk, which brings me to my topic of this blog, the USSA Student cycling champs. Surprisingly this would be my first (and most likely last) time competing in this annual event. This has been due to my focus on triathlon racing in the past years as a student. So I wasn't going to let anything get in the way of this opportunity especially as it was taking place on local soil in Wellington.
The mountain bike race takes on a cross-country style mountain bike race. For those who aren't familiar with mountain biking there are a few forms of mountain bike racing in which the more common two forms are marathon racing and cross-country racing. Marathon racing is what I mostly (well always) compete in consisting of a longer race normally anything from 70 odd kilometers to well over 120km (thats about 4 to 5+ hours of racing) as well as multi-stage events such as the Cape Epic and joBerg2c. Cross-country racing is the official Olympic format that consists of racing laps around a circuit with each lap normally being about 5-7km long depending on the technicality of the circuit resulting in a race aimed to last about 1hr30min to 1hr45min. Therefore one can see that cross-country racing is shorter and as a result very fast and intense throughout, while marathon racing is a real test of endurance.
We were treated to a 6.2km lap around the awesome trails of Walvanpas at the base of Bains Kloof Pass for this event. The start of the race was fast as normal for such a race in order to get into a good position as you enter the first section of single track. I managed to be positioned in 4th place, however, about half way through the first lap I wasn't able to keep up the speed and fell off the pace a bit and back into 5th place by the end of the first lap. My lungs, legs and eyes were burning with the intensity and I couldn't bear to think that I still had 5 laps to go!
Having said this I started warming up... and by the end of the second lap I had moved my way back into 4th place. At this stage I really started enjoying the course and was able to push myself very hard but 3rd place wasn't in sight.
With two laps to go I really started to turn on the gas and said to myself that I wasn't going to come 4th! As I started the 6th and final lap I caught a glimpse of Heiko Redecker from Marties up ahead. I had one lap to make or break it! I managed to catch up to and pass Heiko thus moving into 3rd place. Just as I did this I saw that Adrian Louw from CPUT was only about 100m ahead! I pushed hard to get a small gap over Heiko as he kept up a fight and at the same time with about 2km to go Adrian glanced back on one of the single track switch backs to see me and really put the hammer down to make sure I didn't catch up to him before the finish, while my Blend Property team mate Charles Keey racing for CPUT was ahead and claimed the victory.
But the race wasn't over until the finish line was crossed! With only a small gap I had on Heiko for the last bit of rocky technical single track, while trying to keep it together and not make a mistake causing me to loose my 3rd place he managed to catch up to me without me realizing and thus resulting in a spectacular finish as he tried to sprint past me in the last few meters only to miss-judge the bend and side-swiping me sending us both crashing into the finishing gazebo just short of the line! With natural instinct and a quick reaction I managed to bounce back up, pick my bike up and step over the line to claim a much fought after 3rd place! I was very happy to get onto the podium for a very memorable 2012 student champs!
This is what I managed to get hold of from the photographer:
Results:
1. Charles Keey (CPUT, Blend Property)
2. Adrian Louw (CPUT, Contego Giant)
3. Dave Morison (UCT, Blend Property)
That was the reaction I got from many of the guys at the opening function at Primi in Paarl on Monday night making me feel very old at the age of 27. Just because I managed to find myself a beautiful woman and get married to her doesn't mean I'm old! I'm a registered full-time student at the University of Cape Town (UCT) in my second and final year of completing a Masters Degree in Atmospheric Science. Currently I'm in the think of writing up 18 months worth of research on extreme rainfall synoptics in South Africa into one big thesis that is due on 10 September!
Anyways, enough of the academic talk, which brings me to my topic of this blog, the USSA Student cycling champs. Surprisingly this would be my first (and most likely last) time competing in this annual event. This has been due to my focus on triathlon racing in the past years as a student. So I wasn't going to let anything get in the way of this opportunity especially as it was taking place on local soil in Wellington.
The mountain bike race takes on a cross-country style mountain bike race. For those who aren't familiar with mountain biking there are a few forms of mountain bike racing in which the more common two forms are marathon racing and cross-country racing. Marathon racing is what I mostly (well always) compete in consisting of a longer race normally anything from 70 odd kilometers to well over 120km (thats about 4 to 5+ hours of racing) as well as multi-stage events such as the Cape Epic and joBerg2c. Cross-country racing is the official Olympic format that consists of racing laps around a circuit with each lap normally being about 5-7km long depending on the technicality of the circuit resulting in a race aimed to last about 1hr30min to 1hr45min. Therefore one can see that cross-country racing is shorter and as a result very fast and intense throughout, while marathon racing is a real test of endurance.
We were treated to a 6.2km lap around the awesome trails of Walvanpas at the base of Bains Kloof Pass for this event. The start of the race was fast as normal for such a race in order to get into a good position as you enter the first section of single track. I managed to be positioned in 4th place, however, about half way through the first lap I wasn't able to keep up the speed and fell off the pace a bit and back into 5th place by the end of the first lap. My lungs, legs and eyes were burning with the intensity and I couldn't bear to think that I still had 5 laps to go!
Having said this I started warming up... and by the end of the second lap I had moved my way back into 4th place. At this stage I really started enjoying the course and was able to push myself very hard but 3rd place wasn't in sight.
With two laps to go I really started to turn on the gas and said to myself that I wasn't going to come 4th! As I started the 6th and final lap I caught a glimpse of Heiko Redecker from Marties up ahead. I had one lap to make or break it! I managed to catch up to and pass Heiko thus moving into 3rd place. Just as I did this I saw that Adrian Louw from CPUT was only about 100m ahead! I pushed hard to get a small gap over Heiko as he kept up a fight and at the same time with about 2km to go Adrian glanced back on one of the single track switch backs to see me and really put the hammer down to make sure I didn't catch up to him before the finish, while my Blend Property team mate Charles Keey racing for CPUT was ahead and claimed the victory.
But the race wasn't over until the finish line was crossed! With only a small gap I had on Heiko for the last bit of rocky technical single track, while trying to keep it together and not make a mistake causing me to loose my 3rd place he managed to catch up to me without me realizing and thus resulting in a spectacular finish as he tried to sprint past me in the last few meters only to miss-judge the bend and side-swiping me sending us both crashing into the finishing gazebo just short of the line! With natural instinct and a quick reaction I managed to bounce back up, pick my bike up and step over the line to claim a much fought after 3rd place! I was very happy to get onto the podium for a very memorable 2012 student champs!
This is what I managed to get hold of from the photographer:
 |
| Down we went... |
 |
| All that was needed was a quick recovery and step over the finish line |
Results:
1. Charles Keey (CPUT, Blend Property)
2. Adrian Louw (CPUT, Contego Giant)
3. Dave Morison (UCT, Blend Property)
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