The Engen Dynamic Cycle Challenge was held this last weekend in Wellington and I some good reasons to be looking forward to the race.

 

The first being that the pro teams from Joburg would be down and this would afford me the opportunity to benchmark myself against them. With Bonitas, MTN, Westvaal-BMC and Tasol GT here it meant a number of the top road professionals in the country would be on the line to race. I wanted to see how I would stack up against them. I was quite happy with how I went, bar my sprint at the end where I got boxed in and didn’t really have much of a chance.

 

Secondly and related to the above I hoped the racing would be more positive and thus harder than what we are normally used to here in the Cape. On this front the race didn’t disappoint. The racing was on from the gun and the climb through Riebeck Kasteel provided an opportunity for the 218 rider strong peloton to be split. There was a group of 5 up front including 4 MTN Qhubeka riders, I found myself in the next group of 20 or so riders. There was also a 3^rd group of also 20 riders and these 3 groups joined on the decent. This selection of 50 riders is where the winner would come from.

 

We were also lucky enough to have rolling road closure on the day. This made a huge difference and allowed us to race properly without having to worry about if we were crossing the white line and would be disqualified.

 

Lastly the organisers had put up some good prize money on the day (down to 10^th place I might add). This is a great incentive to the racing and I can assure you all the pros are grateful for it.

 

So all in all a big up to the Engen Dynamic Race Organisers for a great event! Some of our local race organisers could certainly learn a thing or two from them. There will be two further events in the series, one in Port Elizabeth and another in Durban. I however will unfortunately not be able to attend due to other racing commitments.