Cytech trainers take to the trails in SA
Posted on in Cycles News
Graeme Stickells, MD and instructor of Torq Zone Academy, South Africa's first Cytech training centre, took part in this years' edition of the annual Nedbank sani2c MTB race.
The Nedbank sani2c is the world's largest staged MTB race which runs over three days from just outside Himeville, at the foot of the Drakensberg mountain range, to Scottburgh, on the Kwa-Zulu Natal south coast, over a distance of 260km with just over 4000m of climbing. The race consists of three events, the Race, the Adventure and the Trail, with around 600 teams of two riders per team. Each event runs exactly the same route but start and end on consecutive days.
This is the fourth time that Graeme has completed in the race, riding alongside Dirk Oerlemans, Graeme's business partner and owner of Torq Zone Cycles.
The race is so popular that aspiring competitors generally have to wait 5 to 7 years to get an entry. The event is very focussed on local community upliftment and development with many of the local schools and communities providing water points, meals at the race villages, or trail building and cleaning services as part of their fundraising efforts. In the past three years an average of R6,4 million has been raised for these beneficiaries.
"This year I had an outstanding race" said Graeme "my racing partner and I managed to improve my best ever time by 40 minutes. I enjoyed the 2nd day the most. This is the king's stage which is 99km with around 1900m of climbing. The best part of it though is the first 40km which is the descent into the Mighty Umkomaas Valley and the route along the Umkomaas River In summary we achieved an 84th in the GC and a 35th in the Veterans Category with a total time of 12:58:08."
