01 December 2011 No better way to finish the season
Team bizhub finished their season on a successful note winning the overall ladies elite category in the Omnicane Southern Tropical MTB Challenge ...
Jade Roberts
(January 2010, Clarence Training Camp)
MTN Cullinan XCM # 5
It’s been a while since I last wrote a race report – in fact I haven’t written anything
since Attakwas (MTN XCM #1) in January! The reason for this is quite simple: I haven’t
been racing much this year due to injuries sustained during an accident end of January.
The goal of defending the title as MTN series winner 2009 obviously had gone up
in a cloud of dust with this crash and the 6 months that followed where all about
recovering, rehabilitation, learning to be patient and lots of hard work to get
back in form again.
It has been 7 months since the accident and only in the past 4 weeks have I been
feeling confident that my form was finally returning and feeling strong on the bike
again. So I was really looking forward to the MTN Cullinan race. Not having raced
for so long obviously left me in a position where I did not know what to expect,
my race plan was simply to go as hard as possible and get the best possible result,
hopefully a podium position.
The ladies bunch had an extra special rider on the start line (my little sister).
It was nice to be in the same race with her for a change and to see her fight her
heart out to finish for her first time in the leading peloton.
It was only on Friday before the race that I realized Yolande Speedy and Mariska
Strauss would not be competing. I was a bit disappointed and a bit relieved, I guess,
but this did not dampen the mixture of excitement and apprehension I felt before
the race. The route was flat with only short power climbs – total ascent of just
over 1000m - which actually does not suit me very well: I love a climb and the longer
and steeper, the better! So I decided to stick with the other girls initially and
see how it unfolds.
We started with the Ultra marathon men and the start was a dusty sandy fast one,
a real wake-up call! Very early on in the race Yolandi Du Toit, Caitlin de Wet (Specialized/Mr
Price), Karien van Jaarsveld (USN) and myself were sitting behind the elite men,
when we had to negotiate a sharp bend with deep sand… I found myself going for the
deep sand and had to choose between taking out my team mate Yolandi, or trying to
swerve and brake; resulting in me taking a quick tumble. Not a good start! To make
matters worse, the cameramen on their quad bike were right behind me and very nearly
went over me and my bike! By the time I was up and cycling again, Yolandi and Caitlin
had made quite a gap on me. It felt like forever until I managed to catch them again;
they really had a fast start. Shortly after waterpoint 1 Caitlin had a puncture
and had to stop to plug this, I passed her and caught Yolandi and we rode together
for a while. Entering the reserve I made a mistake or two that cost me some time
in the rocky singletrack and Yolandi got away, taking the Queen of the Mountains
(if you can call it a mountain!) points ahead of me. I managed to catch her again
and I was starting to feel stronger, as always taking way too long to get warmed
up and into a rhythm. I was hoping we could stretch the gap between us and the other
girls, but realized soon that Yolandi was starting to pay for the fast start and
unable to stay with me. At this point I just decided to go full gas on my own until
the finish; and was absolutely over the moon to be able to finally win a race again
– my first win in a major individual race in almost a year!
Yolandi Du Toit finished second, making it 1 & 2 for Bizhub, with Karien van Jaarsveld
(USN) 3rd.
It is a great feeling to be able to race again and this means more to me than the
win. So from now until the end of the year I’m looking forward to a full racing
schedule!
