Nissan Sammy Marks 6 Hour Mountain Bike Event
A Resounding Success

Race Report : Advendurance Media

Mountain bikers just love teamwork.

This was proven during Saturday’s Nissan Relay at the Sammy Marks Museum just outside Pretoria. For six hours the riders competed in teams of two or four riders on a 10km lap.

Naturally there were the few brave ones who decided to go it solo for the whole six hours.

Listening to the comments of the riders during and after the race, organizers should seriously consider organizing more mountain biking relays.  It does not often happen that mountain bikers repeatedly use words like ‘awesome ..... amazing ….. stunning …. fun’ to describe their day in the saddle. 

Every single rider agreed that the course with its technical single-track sections made for brilliant racing.

The previous night’s thunder storm played its part in testing the mountain bikers’ skills during the early laps. Quite a number of riders had stories to tell about ‘another one biting the mud’ but nobody complained.  According to them it was mountain biking at its best.

As the day progressed, the track became less slippery and the riders’ lap-times progressively faster.

In the end the day belonged to the youngsters who outrode all the old ‘toppies’ to win the team-relay outright.

The Frikkies, who consisted of two riders from Hoërskool Centurion (Schalk and Ferdie Botha) and two from Sutherland High School (Allan Brittnell and Kyle Wood), managed to do 15 laps (150km) in the specified six hours.

Right from the beginning they were involved in a titanic battle with the youngsters from Team Enduren. One can only speculate about what would have happened if Michael Casey was not forced to stop twice to fix mechanical problems. That meant that they could only complete 14 laps.

Team Enduren’s young riders nearly snatched victory from the jaws of defeat. With three laps to go the team was in the 4th place, but then Shaun Silver rode the fastest lap of the day completing the course in 20 minutes and 57 seconds.  Bert Pauw rode the last lap in 22:58, which meant that they gained 4 minutes.

Team Monties, who also completed 14 laps, was third.

Allan Brittnell (Frikkies) said the secret of relay racing is consistency.

“My team-mates and I tried right from the beginning to ride at a constant pace for the whole period of six hours. If you look at our lap-times you will see that we averaged about 24 minutes per lap.”

Schalk Botha (Frikkies) said he learned the hard way that flat does not necessarily mean easy.

“You really have to dig deep to keep riding at a constant pace on a flat road.”

The corporate team-relay was won by Yoruba Racing. They did 13 laps which, according to Kevin Haywood, is not bad for a bunch of old toppies who are all past 40 years.

Hennie Muller, his team-mate, described the route as ‘awesome’, especially the single-track.

The ‘Kanniedood’ of the day was Julius Cobbett who did 13 (130km) laps.

He said his main goal was to keep riding at 30 minutes per lap.

Darryll Fitzell was 2nd with 12 laps and Albert Retief 3rd with 11 laps.

The solo women’s race was won by Carine Reyneke who managed to complete 9 laps.

Werner Botha and Nickie du Toit won the pairs. In this category the two team-members had to ride together for the whole six-hour period. They managed to do ten laps.

When asked what they enjoyed most about the race, Du Toit jokingly said the Coke they received after finishing their six hours of racing.

Hein Prinsloo (Lazy Professor) and his team-mate finished 2nd in the category, having also completed ten laps.

Prinsloo said it took them some time to get the knack of riding together, but once they had mastered that it was a most enjoyable experience.

“It is definitely some of the best single-track I have ever ridden,” said Pienaar who really is a professor at TUT in real life.

The category for mixed teams was won by Intense Cycling.

Jurie Spykerman (Fritz Pienaar Slaves) said racing a relay was definitely something different.

“It was not just a case of getting on your bike and race flat out from the beginning. You had to ‘strategize’ all the time, making sure that a team-mate does not over-race himself before the six hours was over.”