Teshome wins 2014 Rand Water Race for Victory
Race for Victory was won by Meron Teshome over 150km.
TEAM MTN-Qhubeka’s Meron Teshome won the gruelling 150km Elite race for men over the weekend of Sunday September 21.
The annual race took place at Rand Water in Swartkoppies and the elite race was held over 150km, running from Rand Water through Suikerbosrand and back. This race is considered to be one of the most gruelling road races and is also a qualifier for Cape Argus.
Teshome was followed by Shaun Nick Bester (Westvaal-BMC) and Calvin Beneke (EuropecarSA) with Clint Hendricks (Bonitas) squeezed between Beneke and Morne van Niekerk (Team Abantu).
“I am very happy to win this race, it is the second race in South Africa that I could win, the other one (Cape Argus) I came in second and was disappointing. I am heading for Europe to race in the 2014 UCI Road World Championships, currently under way in Ponferrada, Spain from September 21 to 28.
According to MTN-Qhubeka team manager JP van Zyl, their two best cyclists were involved in an accident and could not race at Race for Victory.
At age 21, Meron Teshome is the reigning Eritrean National Champion, and made his mark at the u.23 World Championships road race in Italy in 2013 in being involved in a prolonged breakaway. He went on to finish the 2014 Tropicale Amissa Bongo sixth in the Overall Youth Classification. Following four days of action-packed criterium racing at the GoWest series, it was then off to the challenging climbs through the Suikerbosrand Nature Reserve – Rand Water Race for Victory. With the sprinters all trying in earnest to get a gap in the first 50km before the race hit the reserve, the racing was at full speed with no breakaway being given an inch by a EuropecarSA led peloton.
Over the two mountains it was JC Nel (Westvaal-BMC) and Tesfom Issak (MTN-Feeder) who emerged from the reserve with a 30-seconds advantage over a chasing group of eight riders. A further 30 seconds back was another group of seven riders, which soon made contact with the first chase group to form a 15-man chasing peloton in pursuit of the two leaders.
As the gap grew to over one minute, Bonitas led the chase with four riders. Young up-and-coming Abantu rider Van Niekerk rode with composure as he followed the wheels of some South Africa’s top climbers. The two leaders were reeled in with 2km to go as the sprint wound up. Bester took a flyer with 500m to go, but it was the Cape Argus Cycle Tour runner-up Teshome who clinched the win on the line.
“I just managed to get ahead of the pack at the finish,’ said Teshome.
Next year annual Rand Water Race for Victory will be celebrating it’s 20th year in existence. Please support Frances Vorwerg, who have been the proud organisers of this prestigious event for all these years, having Rand Water as their principal sponsor.
