This last weekend Ischen and myself were
back racing at the Contego Wines2Whales 3 day event. With a good forecast and no snow predicted this year we were
both looking forward to our last big event for the year.
Stage One started in Lourensford, straight
onto a long climb. Glad of the
warm up we settled into a good pace and moved into the lead half way up. After the first water point I hit a
stump at the edge of a river and ended up swinging round a tree to avoid the
water. Unfortunately there was no
tree for the guy behind who ended up breaking the bridge and ending up with his
bike in the water. I did feel guilty and apologised that night on stage where I had to down a brandy and still walk off stage in a straight line!! Incidents over we settled into a steady pace until Ischen
had a sidewall. She quickly plugged
and bombed it and we were soon off, now in 2nd place. Chasing hard over the Gantouw Pass
Ischen started to cramp and as the course got pretty technical we knew we
weren’t going to win the stage.
Still, we arrived 2nd, losing 2 minutes to Yolande Speedy and
Hanlie Booyens but gaining 14 minutes on Cherise Taylor and Mariska
Strauss.
Stage two was a shorter 65km stage in a
loop from our campsite at Oak Village.
The single track was so smooth unlike yesterday and after a short climb
to space the field out the riding was very enjoyable. I was pretty nervous about the infamous ‘Pofadder’
singletrack and was tempted by the chicken run but in the end managed it
fine. The race was pretty
competitive to start with three woman’s teams together. We lost them on the single track but
there was only 4 minutes separating us at the finish with Contego Ladies taking
the win in 2h54.
Stage three took us down to the coast. Ischen was struggling from the start
and we knew the Contego Ladies were out to take our 2nd place
overall setting off fast on the front line. The course was pretty fast down to
the first water point then there were some tough short climbs to get over. We were riding with the Momentum girls
for a while then dropped off their pace while Ischen battled on feeling the
effects of a long season of racing.
At the third water point Conrad who had been spot on with our bottles
told us we were 7min30 behind leaving us with only 3 minutes for the last
10km. We battled on and the finish
couldn’t come soon enough, it was a stressful day ‘in the office’ but we held
onto 2nd place overall by a mere 50 seconds after 10 hours 38 of
racing. The race was again a
fantastically organized event, well marked, some great new single track and
plenty of sunshine!!
1st Momentum Specialized Insurance Ladies 10hr
25
2nd Bizhub FCF 10hr 38
3rd Contego Ladies 10hr 39
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