These past two weeks have been THE toughest weeks of training I've had in my entire career. Many people don't see the sort of training and dedication that goes into being a professional cyclist. Nutrition is closely monitored, Training, on the bike, often takes up half your day. Recovery is also a crucial roll in getting in quality training. The better you recover, the better you can train the next day, which results in a better outcome when it comes to a race. Mental strength is another key roll of pushing yourself to the next level, pushing through the surface of the pain barrier, teaching your mind to tell the body to keep going. This past weekend I proved to myself that I could do all of these despite a long tough week out on the roads.
The Eston Illovo Race is the largest one day event in the world. A highly prestigious race that attracts many of South Africa's best Professional Mountain Bikers. Riders like Burry Stander, Max Knox, Marc Bassingthwaite, James Reid, Brandon Stewart.... then list of these animals goes on and on.. and on.
Being my first race in the colours of new sponsor Sho-Air/Specialized Factory I really wanted to have a good result, but was totally unsure of how my legs would hold up after the hard weeks training. So, I adopted the approach of, "Go until you blow!" With a junior XCO race only lasting between 1h15-1h30, it was my goal to stay with the big boys until then, anything longer than that was a bonus!
With the first KOM of the 60km race only 2.5km into the race, the heat got turned on really early. The attacks leading up to the final sprint were furious, but I managed to cross the top right on the wheel of Burry Stander, around 5th or 6th. A ferocious counter attack came from Max Knox directly after the summit. Burry seemed to cruise across the gap along with Brandon Stewart. I bit the bullet and pushed to get to the 3 man break. I latched on but pretty soon the race resumed with around 10 riders. To my surprise top riders like Marc Bassi and Mannie Heymans were off the back, but there wasn't time to worry about what was going down behind us. The group hit the next tough climb around 10km in. The bunch split up, with me being ridden off the back. Somehow I managed to ride myself back across the gap, back onto the wheels of the now 8 man strong lead group. This happened one or two more times, but both times I was still able to push the pain away, grit my teeth and, well, GO!
Then came one of the most deciding climbs of the race. Around 25km into the race Max Knox attacked hard. All of us followed, but were soon ridden off by the like of Burry, Brandon and Max. James Reid and Phil Buys were just behind with myself, Marc Bassi and Andrew Warr right on their tails.
I managed to drop Marc and Andrew and began to try and close the gap up to James and Phil, who had now lost a little time on the 2 leaders, Brandon and Burry (Max suffered a puncture). Max managed to close back up to me, and to my surprise I was able to climb with him until he suffered another mechanical. Andrew Warr had also worked his way back, along with Andrew Hill. Unfortunately at around 50km my legs, well, EXPLODED! Andrew Warr managed to get away leaving Hill with me. This is where I had my realization. I just kept pushing on. As hard as it was, I just kept on going as hard as possible. Eventually around 5km later I had managed to shake Hill and was now closing on Warr. I eventually came in 6th Pro/Overall and 1st Junior/u18.
I'm totally ecstatic to have been able to battle it out with the top pro's for some of the race. The race also showed me where my weaknesses are and how I can improve on them. The new bike, a Specialized S-Works Epic 29er, was an absolute dream! Falling more and more inlove with this machine every time I ride it! Big thanks to Sho-Air and Specialized for hooking me up!!
A huge congrats to Brandon Stewart for bringing home the win, to Burry Stander for sprinting home in 3rd after snapping the one side of his bars completely off in a crash around 5km out and most of all to the organisers for putting on another fantastic event!
Until next time
B
Junior mens podium
long hours on the roads in prep for worlds!
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