It has been a fruitful few weeks across the world for several of the top mountain bikers who have become familiar to South Africans through the Absa Cape Epic.
At the weekend cross country world champion Nino Schurter, who thrilled Absa Cape Epic watchers with some exhilarating stage wins this year, was on the top step of the podium at an UCI World Cup event again.
Schurter won the sixth round of the UCI cross country world cup competition at Windham in the United States - for the second week in a row seeing off a strong challenge from Julien Absalon, the championship leader from France.
A week earlier the Swiss world champion also finished just ahead of Absalon at Mont-Sainte-Anne in Quebec, Canada. However, his decision to skip a world cup event and some bad luck while racing earlier this year is likely to cost him a second successive overall world cup title to the consistent Frenchman, who retains a handy points lead with only one event to go. Schurter would have to win the final round and Absalon finish lower than 28th to stop the French champion from claiming the title.
This weekend also saw several top marathon riders competing in the rugged Leadville 100 - more than 160 kilometres of riding across the Canadian Rockies. The event was eventually won by American Todd Wells after four times Epic winner Christoph Sauser lost time with a puncture and could not quite get back to the front - he eventually finished 16 seconds back. 2014 Absa Cape Epic winner Kristian Hynek was leading by nearly four minutes at one stage, but apparently ran out of steam to eventually come third.
On the previous weekend Urs Huber, now Karl Platt’s regular Epic partner, was showing his marathon pedigree with a fine win in the taxing Ischgl Iron Bike race in Austria. Huber, also Swiss, held off a race-long challenge from German Markus Kaufmann over the 79km course, which includes an eye-watering 3 800m of altitude gain.
A week earlier Kaufmann and his Epic partner Jochen Kaess were showing what might have been after their commanding win in the eight-day Transalp Challenge from July 20 to 26.
Their win in the tough racing conditions over 587km reflected a similar performance from them on Stage 1 of the 2014 Absa Cape Epic, where they came home two minutes ahead of the rest of the field. Sadly, Kaess’s frame broke on Stage 2 of the Epic and they lost nearly two hours - impossible to recover.
At the Transalp, though, they had a largely problem-free run and were celebrating a win of more than 10 minutes over Daniel Geismayr, a 2012 Absa Cape Epic finisher, and Hannes Genze, himself a five-times Absa Cape Epic top five finisher.
The Transalps - which takes riders from Germany through Austria and into Northern Italy - proved to be fruitful for other Epic stars too. These included Hynek of the Czech Republic, who finished third overall with Alban Lakata of Austria, another regular visitor to South Africa and six times Epic finisher.
Perhaps most noteworthy though was another extraordinary performance by South African Andrew McLean and his Epic partner Heinz Zorweg of Austria, who won the Grand Masters divisions and finished 20th overall. They won the corresponding class - for riders of 50 and older - at the Absa Cape Epic, managing to finish 15th overall.
McLean, a member of the Cycle Lab Supercycling powered by Toyota club, told Tread magazine: “That was tough! There was a lot of climbing. Huge climbs compared to what we have in South Africa. We had hard rain, cold and heat throughout the event so it was a real allround challenge.
“Heinz had two bad days, Stage 2 where he struggled with the cold and rain that we weren’t exactly prepared for in terms of clothing choice and Stage 5 where he was ill. But he’s so tough and just kept soldiering on. He’s an incredible athlete.
“I struggled a bit on some of the steep, technical descents. I wasn’t expecting such difficult downhill sections and had to go slow and walk some bits. The general skill level among riders in Europe is a lot higher than the level in South Africa, but it makes for a very complete mountain biking challenge,” added McLean.
Swiss pairing Cornelia Hug and Andrea Fässler won the women’s event.
Karl Platt and Christoph Sauser win NTT Masters category in fine style
