The Freedom Challenge
Strong Winds Whip Riders In The Stormberg
Press Release / 20.06.2011
Early race leader, Ugene Nel battled with mechanical problems as he headed across the upper catchment of the Umzimvubu and Tina Rivers forcing him to convert his bike to a single speed. However, his problems became far more serious after he left the village of Vuvu. Rather than taking the far longer route on the jeep track and road up to Naude’s Nek Pass, the highest vehicle pass in South Africa, he relied on his adventure racing background and commenced the ascent up Lehana’s Pass, a 4 km mule track that climbs 1000 metres up the face of the Maluti Drakensberg escarpment.
Carrying his bike, he was initially buffeted by heavy winds. Shortly thereafter it started snowing and before reaching the top it was a complete white out. With the temperatures well below freezing he arrived at the village of Rhodes with his riding companion, Sean Woolnough, at midnight. “There were times that it was on the edge�, he said.
Woolnough’s hardship continued. Exhausted by these earlier efforts, on Saturday he fell back from his riding group and with light fading he was unable to find his way off the Bonthoek. He spent a freezing Saturday night sleeping rough on the mountain.
Further ahead on the race route, it is Garth Flanders who continues to do the trail blazing. However, his progress has also been slowed. Heavy rains and snow have made the riding surfaces difficult. A gale force wind over the Stormberg has also forced him and other riders to push their bikes on sections of the trail that would normally offer easy riding. On Friday he rode from the Bonthoek and the village of Rossouw along the route taken by Smuts and his commando when they re-entered the Cape Colony during the Anglo Boer war.
Saturday saw him riding through the site of the Battle of Stormberg but he was unable to make the next support station at Romansfontein. Stopping to seek directions he was seduced into taking refuge for the night on the farm Groot Zeekoeigat, previously home to the South African artist and writer, Johannes Meintjies. On Sunday, he continued over the Aasvoelsberg and dropped into the open expanses of the Great Karoo near the town of Hofmeyr.
SleepMonsters
