Knox And Stewart On Song At Isuzu 3 Towers
In Mpumalanga

Race Report : News Center

“Get me to the church on time” is one of the hits from the famous musical ‘My Fair Lady’.  In a cycling context, however, it seems that the words of the song should be adapted to ‘Get me to the race on time’.

Brandon Stewart and Max Knox (DCM) yesterday (Thursday, 24 September) won the first stage (75 km with 2000 meters of climbing) of the Mankele Three-day Mountain Bike Tour in the Lowveld.

However, listening to them it seems that it could easily have been a case of ‘all dressed up and nowhere to race’.

According to Stewart they were under the impression that the race would only start today, 25 September.

“On Wednesday Max and I were out on an eight-hour training session in Johannesburg.  About halfway through we started to talk about the Mankele Tour.  I told a friend that I was really looking forward to the tour on Friday.  He then told me that, as far as he knew, the tour would start on Thursday.

“Having confirmed that the tour really started a day earlier than we expected, Max and I had to hurry to get to Mankele, just outside Nelspruit.

“We only arrived in the Lowveld at 23:30.”

Luckily the lack of sleep and the long drive did not seem to have an effect on Stewart and Knox.

According to Knox, they managed to drop the two Garmin-adidas riders, Francois Theron and Philip Buys, on the first serious climb, due to the fast pace set by Stewart.

When the two of them realized that they were not in danger of being caught, they took things slightly easier, making sure not to take any unnecessary risks on the downhills and trying to save as much energy as possible.

With Stewart and Knox having secured a lead of nearly 5 minutes, the challenge is now with Theron and Buys to make a come-back during today’s stage of 80 kilometers.