Elite ladies participated in the Anatomic Jock National Classic in Mpumalanga for the first time this past weekend, and the ladies teams contesting the 150km route included Proline Computers, C Bist and Harmony.
The route took the ladies towards White River, turning to Brondal and then back to Nelspruit, and the National Classic featured two hotspot awards, and the Queen of the Mountain prize.
The race quickly developed into a front group of five ladies, who lead the bunch to the first 35 kilometres hotspot won by Robyn de Groot (Team Proline Computers), who demonstrated her intentions clearly enough.
Just before the group got to Nelspruit, the front breakaway group was caught by another four ladies, as the new route rejoined the old 104km course.
On the notorious Boulders climb, the front pelaton was ripped to pieces by Marissa van der Merwe (Team Proline), De Groot, Minette Naude (Harmony) and Lizanne Naude (C Bist).
Van der Merwe emerged on top of Boulders as the tour’s Queen of the Mountains, narrowly beating Naude, and after a vicious down-hill race, Robyn de Groot joined up with Van der Merwe and Naude, the trio working together to open a time-gap of almost 2 minutes over the chasing cyclists.
De Groot surprised the frontrunners with a clever move 125 kilometres into the race, leaving Naude behind with teammate Van der Merwe covering her, while she slowly opened the gap on the two.
At 130km into the race the gap was 40 seconds, which De Groot continuously increasing the time gap to a finishing 2.40 lead as she took 1st place, with her teammate Van der Merwe finishing second, with Naude claiming bronze.
Results:
1 Robyn de Groot (Proline)
2 Marissa vd Merwe (Proline)
3 Minette Naude (Harmony)
4 Lizanne Naude (C Bist)
5 Louise Murphy (Harmony)
Awards:
1st Hotspot: Robyn de Groot
2nd Hotspot: Robyn de Groot
Queen of the Mountains: Marissa vd Merwe
2nd Hotspot: Robyn de Groot
Queen of the Mountains: Marissa vd Merwe
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