Cycling Fever Hits Town

FREDERICK KEBADIRETSE
Staff Writer | Monday August 13, 2012 00:00

 

Even the freezing temperatures did not deter the emphatic competitors from giving the spectators a handful of some fun filled cycling. The riders competed in seven categories of juniors, open, kids, mountain bike, Hamba, team open and team juniors. The activities of the day got underway with heat races that had participants cycling around a fully barricaded 0.5 kilometres track specially designed in the parking area.The juniors finished their competition first to open way for more seasoned cyclists to take on to the track in a fierce competition to progress all the way to the finals. A total of six laps were completed in all heats and semi-finals.

The challenge seemed to be not simple as some may have thought with riders having to carefully manoeuvre around tricky curves in the track to avoid falling off and injuring themselves. The medics had to be called to the track a couple of times to attend to casualties who had slipped and fallen on the track.This however, did not stop the fun as the competition progressed towards the finals.  The Hamba race proved to be the crowd's favourite with a couple of local riders pushing their heavily pimped black machines round the track. At the end, local champion, Angus Boxshall-Smith of Gaborone Cycling Club (GCC) emerged the overall winner in the open category. Comma5 team won the teams' category. Top three in all individual categories and team category winners won several prizes including cash and some goodies.

There were also raffle draws that had winners walking away with a sports bicycle valued at P15, 000 and a Hamba bicycle. In addition to the major activities, there were a couple more interesting entertainment activities that included motor bikers parading their heavily powered machines around the track much to the excitement of the crowd. A popular stunt biker from Cape Town, Dylan Victor kept the crowd holding their breaths performing some gravity defying moves with his specially designed bike. There was also something for the fitness enthusiast with a three-hour spinning triathlon instructed on the side by local fitness guru Thuto Thuto.

According to Keith Marais, the brains behind the challenge, the inaugural challenge was a huge success and they will definitely do it again next year with a plan to make it an annual event. He said the concept was to make cycle racing more urban and take it to the people. Grand-Prix style cycling or criteriums (sic), are good for live spectators as they allow them to see the riders pass by many times unlike in long distance racing where they can only be viewed once passing by spectator points. They are the most common type of bicycle racing in the continental United States while also gaining popularity as a format for mountain bike events.