Alex Miller and Vera Looser were on Saturday crowned champions in the male and female categories of the 2022 Nedbank National Mountain Bike Marathon Championships held at Farm Otjompaue in Windhoek.
Miller successfully retained the elite men’s title that he won last year by beating his closes competitor, Tristan de Lange, in a sprint finish after three laps of racing on a newly designed 20 kilometres (km) course.
The two young cyclists broke off from the rest of the peloton just after the first lap of the race.
Ingrim Cuff, who had a lonely race throughout the afternoon, finished the 60km race in third place, 10 minutes behind the winner.
In the elite women’s category, Looser was crowned the new champion of the Nedbank National Mountain Bike Marathon after finishing the race with a 24-second lead from her closes rival.
Anri Krugel finished the race in second place, while Courtney Liebenberg finished in third, 22 minutes behind Krugel.
In the junior men’s category, Daniel Hahn was crowned champion, while his Cymot Cycling teammate, Kevin Lowe, came second.
Theuns van der Westhuizen took the last podium position in that category.
In an interview with Nampa after the race, Miller said the new course wasn’t as easy as he expected it to be.
“It was good having Tristan alongside me as this track had steep climbing but going for a tight sprint made everything fun and I am happy to have defended my title,” he said.
De Lange told this agency that Miller and himself just came back from an off-season and were not sure of their body shapes but he was happy to be back on the bike once again.
Meanwhile, Looser told this agency that it was a bit hard for her to race 2000 metres below sea level after coming from almost sea level in Europe.
“It was a good race with Anri behind my tail throughout. which made it interesting as I could not slip up. I am happy to once again be crowned national champion in the mountain bike category after a long time of not competing in this event,” said Looser.
Source: The Namibian Press Agency
