Van Zyl is Mascom tsela riders champ

FREDERICK KEBADIRETSE
Staff Writer | Monday May 14, 2012 00:00

 

Neville Van Zyl won the race with a time of 02:19:06 followed by teammates, Keith Marais and Sean McCormick who clocked 02:19: 07 and 02:19:08 to finish second and third respectively. The race took the cyclists from the Game City shopping Complex in Gaborone joining the A1 road at the Western Bypass all the way to Rasesa turnoff and back to finish at Game City. It turned out that none of the cyclists emerged as a definite leader throughout the race as the leaders rode in a pack of more than 20 to the finish line.

With the air still in the morning at the start of the race, the cyclists had a smooth ride on the initial route going north with the leaders maintaining their speed around 60 km/hr. There was however, a slight headwind in the return ride to Gaborone as the leading pack kept on varying their speed along the road bends.

The GCC quartet kept within the front row of the leading pack for the last 20 kilometres of the race despite a strong competition by all cyclists in the pack. It was at the final sprint that Marais managed to break away leading up to the Kgale view roundabout.

His teammate van Zyl however, took advantage of the bend from A1 at Game City/Lobatse traffic lights to sprint out in the final stretch, but could only cross the finish line a millisecond behind Marais and two milliseconds behind McCormick. Van Zyl, who is no stranger to winning local cycling events congratulated fellow for keeping him out of breath to the finish line. 'Today the competition was very strong. The guys just hanged in there to the end, I wanted to break away at some point, but they could not let me off,' he said.

He hailed his American made 9.8kilograms machine for handling the route well as it never developed  any mechanical challenges.  Meanwhile, Anouk Lorato Van der Geest of Tsela Riders was the first woman to arrive at the finishing line. GCC's Nadire Mynhard followed her and Albertinah Milton came third.

In the 30 kilometres race, Hezekiel Sibanda was the overall winner with a time of 48:10:79. Tawana Kantibe and Kevin Kefithele finished second and third. For women, Debbie Baille came first followed by Matlhogonolo Ramocha and Elaine Welsh. There was also a kiddies' fun cycle and a special category for Hamba bicycles. The event was organised by Tsela Riders and sponsored by Mascom among others.