MAFUTSENI ROAD RACE - A COMEDY OF ERRORS?!

NOPE, that's not me amongst the finishers of the 100km race!

 

You may have noticed by the silence of my blog that cycling has not figured large in my life lately.  Indeed I've taken a sabatical from my two-wheeled steed.  I seemed to have reached my limit on it.  Races were no longer fun.  I was struggling to finish, whereas before I'd be struggling for the winning sprint.. In almost 100 races I'd amassed 7 wins and no small number of podiums, both in Mozambique and abroad.  So my cycling success was tied to my cycling life.  But when my competitiveness took a dive so did my interest in the sport. Those 5am wakeup rides in the middle of winter are hard to justify when you can't put two pedal strokes together. I'm running out of mataphor's here!!!
Anyway fast forward a year and I'm finally (after a few attempts) back on the bike, in a manner of speaking.  For three weeks now I'm managed to do my daily rides like a diligent schoolboy, although the longer rides still elude me.  Family commitments you see.... But still, I was doing a lot better than a month or 6 ago.  So when the opportunity to sign up for a race in Swaziland came up I couldn't resist.  Obviously this would be a warm-up event for me, a training ride.  Plus I'd made a promise to my 8 year old son, who is as competitive as they come, and who wanted to taste success in a big race.  His race would be 20km long.. long for an 8 year old, but considering he'd done 16km a year back with me at his side, I thought it couldn't hurt him (too much).  And so I decided to do the 50km event.. not exactly something I'd like to brag about, used to doing the longer events.. but that way I'd be able to catch my son (I reasoned).  Plus I'm not in tip-top shape yet, and I'd yet to break the 50km barrier anyway in my training rides so far.. So it seemed a reasonable ask of my body. 
So the race day approached and so my preparations and training ramped up.. I perfected the art of the negative taper.. i.e. to ride harder and longer as race day approached! Well, when all else fails, try doing the opposite of conventional wisdom!  I even had my son out riding whenever possible, tuning up his bike, making sure his kit was all sorted, bike serviced and gears ticking over perfectly.

We left for Swaziland on saturday hoping for light traffic but encountering a wall of cars that would have discouraged anyone.. The traffic extended from Maputo all the way to Boane.. something unprecedented.  I shudder to think what this city will be like in a few years..  Once in Swaziland we took a detour to check out the race distance for my son, a 20km out and back route.. And boy was I surprised.  I'd done this race 3 times in the past, coming in 4th overall and 1st vet once before.. But I had completely forgotten what the first hill looked like.. A long straight wall that would have daunted any cyclist let alone me in my relatively untrained state, and let alone my son who was going to do only his second major race.. and 8 years old to boot!  It was savage.  I brushed off the worry from my face and told him he'd be fine.. I thought.  Worst that can happen, he'll have to walk it.  Well actually, the worst that could happen would be that he couldn't finish...

So the next day it was an early and rushed wakeup.  The whole family piled into the car, scoffing stolen croissants from the just-opened breakfast room in the hotel..  A long drive to the start and then I quickly set about assembling the bikes, pedals, wheels, break levers.  The frenzied pre-race meet with other Moz riders ensued.. and the bad news that Miguel Duarte, last year's winner and our main Club rider stuck at the border with car trouble. And if that wasn't enough.. he had James Gabel's bike!  James, who had won the 50Km last year, had come in the day before and was looking forlorn..  His form had seen him enter our "elite" ranks and he was regularly 2nd to Miguel, and his lighter weight potentially propelling him further up the ranking.  He'd have to sit this one out.. Anyway, prep not over yet.. Fit the race numbers and timing chips.. All set to go.  My proposed warmup didn't happen as prep took too long so I joined my 50km peloton, waving to my sons and wife, while they waited for the 20km start. 

And we're off!  The peloton starts at a blistering pace and I'm clinging on to dear life when I feel the squish of my tyres and realise that I've forgotten to pump them up.. as well as my son's tyres.  So as I try to whip out my phone to call my wife BANG a crash in front of me and all of a sudden 4 riders are down, and I have no option but to screech to a halt.  I check to see if they're all right.. more wounded pride than any blood, so I'm quickly off in search of the peloton, which has not waited a second to put the nail in our coffin!  I hopscotch off riders, avoiding the headwind where possible and work my way back to the main bunch, but it's hard work..  By the time I see them they're halfway up the hill and stragglers are falling off  the back like water off a ducks back.  I join one of these straggler groups, but the peloton is truly on it's way..  Finally I can get my phone out and call but no cel signal!! Arghh!  So now back to the business of racing..  I'm with a young kid, in his teens, who's setting a strong pace but has no idea of riding in a group, constantly in the gutter and avoiding the huge amount of glass by miracle..  We're soon joined by another rider who yoyo's off the back as we push on.  With my weight advantage and aero position I take up the work on the descents and flats, and try and hang on for dear life on the climbs where the kid really sticks it to me..  Now we're four and reaching the turn point but then chaos as I'm in front on my own, one rider's gone straight past the turn and the young kid is stuffing his face 100m behind me.. I judiciously wait for him and we get back into our rythmn, me pushing on the descents and he doing the climbs.  By now the wind is side/back so not too bad.  We're joined again by the yoyo champion who immediately starts trying to outsprint the kid!  I tell them to cool it. Too early to fight.. Let's get closer to the finish.  We settle into a syncopated rythmn and halfway back are joined by another rider from behind. 

He's big and strong and sets a pace at the front which I try and emulate. However the legs are getting tired and painful. Am I the only one?  Finally we reach the long descent and I'm on the front powering in my 53x11 and reaching some seriously fast speed.  It feels good to be going so fast, but my partners are letting me do all the work here!  Anyway, two more climbs to go to the finish.. I'm looking at my odometre and wondering how long this pain is going to last.  A 50km race may sound easy, but it's just as hard as a long race... It's just that the suffering last less!  I've finished my turn on the front and the big guy is back out front tapping an nice rythmn.. The kid is hanging back and yo-yo is really starting to worry me as he's not doing any work.  We crest the hill and the finish is in sight, just under a km away.  It feels so close that I'd almost like to sprint from here, but experience has taught me otherwise.. the final rise just before the finish kills any long-distance escape.. I'll have to chose my time carefully.. The young kid pushes his way through us and yoyo goes to the back, rising out of his saddle and waiting to pounce.. The big guy is on the left, they kid next to him and I line up on the right, my ear cocked to hear any gear changes from yo-yo behind. The line gets closer.. the tempo increases..  The line could be 100 or 200 or even 300m away.. I can't tell. But I go. Not a sprint in the conventional sense.. there's no energy for that. But a good powerful dig and head down as I push and push on the pedals.  the first 20 strokes are done almost with my eyes closed.. I open to check I'm still going straight and then under me to see if I'm dragging anyone with me.  No shadow. I'm on my own.  I look down at my wheel and push as hard as I can, but my cadence is slowing as the rise starts sapping at my speed and energy.  The finish line is getting closer.. I look through my legs again.. Still no shadow.  The line comes fast. I pedal faster, some magic extra ounce of power coming through the legs.. I'm across!  Had that been a sprint for first, your attention in reading thus far would have been warranted.  But that was for 12 place! Sorry to disappoint.  Still it felt good.  The instinct for the sprint is still alive and well.  I hooked up with the kid right after.. he finished 4th in our sprint.  He was 14!  I told him he'd become a really good cyclist soon.  He was really quite strong. YoYo also came past for a hand-shake.  He'd managed 2nd in the sprint.  I didn't see the big guy after that.  He must have worked really hard to catch us + the work on the climbs must have taken it out of him..
My kids ran up to me as I finished.. and I hesitantly asked how my son had done.  I saw the course.  I felt the headwind.  The first climb were my peloton had it's crash was quite steep and long.  I wondered if he'd managed to finish... HE HAD!  Not only that.. a healthy time of 1:20! I set out trying to catch him, estimating his speed at 2:00 hours..  I WAS impressed.  Unfortunately his agegroup was 12 years and under, with most kids at the upper end of the scale, so he was only 8th in his agegroup.. So his disappointment showed a bit.. But all things considered... I truly was impressed.

A few minutes went by and then I saw Rory McBride coming through the finish.  He'd beaten his race time from last year, and managed under two hours.  Then James Gabel came through on a Mountain Bike!  Quite incredible the organisers had found him a bike and though he started quite late managed to catch quite a few backmarkers and even helped one of the ladies back to the podium!  His missfortune turned into a mini-victory, a test of perseverance in adversity.  I for one was impressed.

An hour later the 100km riders were coming through - a tight bunch of 12 riders that had stuck together all the way.  I managed to shoot off a few frames as they came through the finish.. The usual suspects were there, Calvin Lowe, William Kelly plus lots of new names and faces. And at the back of them I spotted Emil.. He'd had a bad puncture at 45km and after trying to swap out the tube and puncturing again ended up using a Goo wrapper to keep his tyre intact, so DNSed.  He waited for the peloton to catch him on the return leg and rode in with them.

So how did the Clube de Ciclismo de Moçambique do in this race?!  Considering the DNS's and DNF one might be tempted to call it a Comedy of Errors.  However I felt it was a real success. Different riders went to the race with different objectives and all managed to get something out of it.  Emil managed to finish with the lead bunch.  James had a good strong ride notwithstanding riding an MTB.  My son managed to finish his race, rode faster than many adults and rode on his own.  I managed to finish my race and have a half-decent sprint at the end.  Rory beat his previous time.  Rui and Miguel managed a decent training ride in Goba.  No, not a comedy of errors but a case of a silver lining in every cloud.

Lastly a big thanks to Newcom Wheelers (race organsing club), Dups (sponsor) and Cycling Association of Swaziland.  They put on a fantastically organised event with great race support, water points, police escort, media attention, trophies and prize-money for the finishers and a welcome food area post race.  Results were issued very quickly by the timing company.  And lastly the Swazi hospitality and sportsmanship really makes us want to come back every year!

Dups Mafutseni Race - 24th of May 2015.  Race results available here.