ProTouch mark their fifth participation at Tour du Rwanda

The Honeydew-based ProTouch Continental Cycling team, Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI) that is on top of the official road cycling rankings, arrived safely in Kigali, Rwanda for the Tour du Rwanda on Saturday, February 19.

Sunday, February 20 saw the start of the 14th Tour du Rwanda which is the only UCI 2.1 category race in Africa. It kicked off with a 4km time trial / prologue around the Kigali Arena.

The members of the strong, five-men ProTouch team are Samuel Mugisha, Charles Kagimu, Moise Mugisha, Kent Main and Callum Ormiston.

Kent, the top-placed African rider displayed great riding, while Callum, the newly crowned U23 Road Champion teamed up with Charles, the reigning Ugandan Road Champion to sport their national flags.

The organisers once again designed a high-class route with 31 climbs over the eight stages. The 19 teams will take on four stages dedicated to the climbers, two to sprinters, one for the puncheurs and a time trial.

Stage 2 of the race was for the sprinters with 148km from Kigali to Rwamagana that saw 1 524m of elevation and ten laps of the stadium.

Eight kilometres into the race, Leo Hayter from the British National Team launched the offensive, joined by two Moroccans and Belgian Abram Stockman who was the only one to follow Hayter in the last laps of the final circuit.

The two riders stayed away until the last kilometre before being caught by the peloton that went fast for the final sprint.

Sandy Dujardin dominated another French rider, Axel Laurance, who finished second and Colombian Jhonatan Restrepo third. Jhonatan won five stages of the Tour du Rwanda in the previous years.

ProTouch’s Samuel and Callum broke off the front in a small chasing group of four riders before getting caught.

The peloton stayed together until the end, with all ProTouch riders finishing in the bunch.

The general classification remained unchanged while Alexandre Geniez kept his place as the leader and wore the yellow jersey for the third stage between Kigali and Rubavu over a distance of 155,9 kilometres and 2 348m of vertical elevation.

ProTouch’s Kent remains as the top-placed African rider 0.17” behind the leader on General Classification (GC).