11:23 PM
Admin.
Merhawi Kudu of World Cycling Centre Africa (WCCA), made history when he won the Engen Dynamic Cycle Challenge in Port Elizabeth on Sunday 21 October. Kudu made his move in the final 5km of the race, held at the Aldo Scribante race track.
The race was under threat to be cancelled due to the inclement weather the friendly city had been under for the last few days. Heavy rain fall had caused a number of roads to be closed and meant that the 100km race could not start at the Altona Primary School and for safety reasons the mass event had to be cancelled.
Organisers though were able to make an alternative arrangement by making use of the Aldo Scribante race track. The race, originally scheduled to be a 100km in line with the series distance was changed to 150km upon request of the pro teams. That meant that the riders would do 60 laps of the 2.5km circuit.
To keep the tempo up, sprint primes were added. Every alternate ten laps a prime of R500 was up for grabs for the leaders and the bunch. This added a new dynamic to the racing and ensured that the teams didn’t merely race to set up the finish for their sprinters.
With 15 laps to go, a group of 12 riders were able to open a gap of 1minute 45seconds on the peleton and it was curious to see that none of the proverbial big teams, such as MTN-Qhubeka, Bonitas and Tasol had more than one rider in the main break.
Instead it was the likes of Cape Town based Nu Water, WCCA and the Klerksdorp based team of Westvaal that had made the jump and this played into the hands of Merhawi Kudu. Thewin is the first for the UCI African development team and will have given them a massive boost.
“Our team is currently in training for the Africa Championships in November and Bonitas and MTN-Qhubeka have had a long season,” said WCCA Team Manager JP van Zyl. “So we had the distance in the legs and with two laps to go I told Merhawi to go. And he did”
Team Bonitas won the most primes (3) with Tasol winning two. The rest were split up amongst the rest of the riders. The race cut short by five laps as the intemperate weather coming in again had caused the safety officers to be wary and rather shorten the race.
WCCA are now also on top of the Series rankings, six points ahead of Team MTN-Qhubeka, with Westvaal Delta -BMC in third.
The third and final leg of the Engen Dynamic Cycle Challenge will take place in Durban at Moses Mabhida Stadium on 11 November.