Cape Town – With one day yet to run at the Absa Cape Epic, a magnificent retirement from what is regarded as the greatest annual stage mountain bike race awaits for a Swiss regarded as an honorary South African after the second-last day of the race in Wellington.
Christoph Sauser of Switzerland and Stellebosch won the sixth stage of the Cape Epic with his partner, Jaroslav Kulhavy, the Czech who is the current Olympic champion, in a sprint finish. The Investec-Songo-Specialized, who are raising funds and awareness for the Songo upliftment programme in Kayamandi in Stellenbosch. After what was a kinder day to the riders after a week of mud, rain and rocks, Kulhavy and Sauser lifted the pace, with only defending champion Kristian Hynek and his Topeak Ergon partner, Alban Lakata, strong enough to hold their wheel.
Defending champions Ariane Kleinhans and Annika Langvad (Team RECM Specialized) took it “easy” yet still romped home in first ahead of Team Ascendis Health’s Jennie Stenerhag and Robyn de Groot who were 17 minutes down. “We considered pushing it, but we don’t need to take risks,” said Langvad. “Right now it’s all about getting to the finish, so we don’t actually need to dig too deep. I’m very relieved it’s almost over.”
“Today was a lot more fun, though. The rain kept the dust away and the singletrack was great,” said Kleinhans.
It was a close-run thing in the men’s race, according to Epic organisers, as “Hynek misjudged his line through a corner just before the finish and the Sauser- Kulhavy combination pipped them for their fifth stage win out of six”. It was an incredible 36th Cape Epic stage for Sauser, who is racing in his last Epic at the age of 39. “It was a very exciting finish and today we didn’t have to eat dust (thanks to the rain). There was 30km of lovely singletrack today,” said Sauser.
“Now we have one more stage and we’ll do everything to win it,” said Kulhavy, who has a 10 minute and 51 second gap over Hynek and Lakata in second overall. Hynek admitted he had missed out on a stage win by miscalculating the final sprint.
“It was the best day of riding in the whole week,” said Lakata. “We’ve had four second places so far and we have to win a stage.”
Five South African finished in the top 10, but Team Bulls’ Karl Platt, a four-time winner, and Urs Huber, struggled, coming home over 13 minutes adrift while Jose Hermida and Rudi van Houts (Multivan Merida) were some 22 minutes behind the winners.
Saturday will see small several battles in a big war as Scott Factory Racing’s Philip Buys and Matthys Beukes seek to hold on to the African jersey for the first team made up of fully African teams to finish. “Our goal this morning was to get the red, so it was a bonus to get on the podium as well,” said Buys. – Independent Media