Happy happy times. It is always a very busy weekend this one when it is the Amashova cycle race. A race from Pietermaritzburg to Durban. Our friends from Johannesburg come to stay for the weekend for the race and always a great time.
This year however i decided that my friend from school needs to experience this race and do it. He is in the hostel at school so he came and stayed at my house for the weekend. On the Saturday before the race I gave him a taste of what it is like to be an Pro-Amateur cyclist and what needs to be done the day before the race. Checking the bike, going for a light ride, drinking a lot of water and also registering. Carbo loading was also something new to him and he really enjoyed that part.
After a lovely dinner the night before at Pesto's Restaurant in PMB, we all got out of bed on our own time. Some of us had to be at the start at 6 and others 7:11am. To me it wasn't different to usual races, but I felt really welcome when I met up with my fried Nico from Team Westvaal-BMC. He explained to me all the key things about road racing and what to do. That definitely gave me some confidence for the race.
The start was a lot different to what i am used to. We started of slowly just rolling down the road, where i normaly start races where we go full out from the start. I guess it has a lot to do with the distances we are doing. In 45kms you can go very hard but with 106km's to do you have to save your energy for later. I had a wonderful experience in the peleton and loved the sound of tubulars rolling over the road. In the last 2km's of our race I laughed a lot when some of us Junior riders tried braking off of a Vet men group, but just got 5 meters on them and realized we have restricted gears and were spinning like crazy. The Vet men came past us with a storm and also laughing. From there on we sat up on the bikes and just rode to the finish. My time was 2hrs & 47mins for the 106km's.
I learnt a lot in the race and also how you have to focus the whole time. Touching the wheel in front of you can be costly but at least i didn't do that.
My friend, Marnus, also had a great ride for his first Amashova and felt less tired than I did. He even said that i might have given him to much tips for the race and that's why he wasn't as tired as I was. It was a super fun weekend and really enjoyable. I will try and do the Amahova every year till i can't no more.
Jaco
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