De Groot Takes Wellness World Cycle Tour

Race Report : Alex Cooper

Team Nashua Telecoms dominated the Wellness World Cycle Tour ladies race over 100km in George on Saturday 22-08-09 while Team Daikin, from Cape Town, dominated the men’s race.

The ladies started, this very tough race with numerous steep climbs, with the elite men and vets. From the start it was clear that Team Daikin was not going to show any mercy as the bunch was ripped to shreds within the first 3 km. A hard pace was set by Team Daikin and Marcello up Maalgate Climb leaving several cyclists behind with Robyn de Groot and Anriette Schoeman (Nashua Telecoms) the only ladies surviving in the main bunch holding their ground.

At Kleinbrak more cyclist were left behind on the very steep 2km Kleinbrak climb with De Groot and Schoeman holding their ground. At Hartenbos the route turned to Oudtshoorn. As expected Daikin launched a vicious attack on the 1km steep Ruitebos climb 44km into the race. This broke the bunch into three smaller bunches with Schoeman and De Groot in the second bunch. They however managed to get back, to the leading bunch, on the decent as the race turned back to Hartenbos.

The Daikin team managed to get Allistar Davis one of their riders away with an Oudtshoorn club cyclist at Kleinbrak 60km into the race on the way back to George. The outnumbered Pieter Lambert (Marcello) tried his outmost best to close the gap but tactical cycling by Moolman Welgemoed (Daikin) neutralized this attempts. At Glentana the Oudtshoorn rider was caught just before the very steep 4km Glentana Climb while David Larrett (Daikin) powered ahead. Moolman Welgemoed launched an attack at the bottom of the Glentan Climb 77km into the race shattering the bunch in to many individual groups.It was at this stage that De Groot lost contact with Schoeman who took the QOM. The break managed to catch Davis near the top of the climb. Lambert ,Africa, Moolman, Heynsstay and Larrett formed the break away leading group. With 10km to go Larrett got away to take 1st place in 2:36:22:32 with Moolman 2nd in 2:36:58:36 and Danzil Africa 3rd in the same time.

 De Groot managed to get back to Schoeman as part of chasing group with 15km to go.
 De Groot finished 1st in 2:39:21:92 with Anriette Schoeman 2nd in the same time and Lulu Jooste 3rd in 3:21:38:68