Dust test young riders’ mettle to the max
"A lot of people, including myself, underestimated the difficulty of this event by a long shot but I still had an absolute blast in Argentina and I'm over the moon about my bronze medal," he said.
The talented youngster, Brendan Swanevelder recently returned from San Juan, Argentina, with a bronze medal in his pocket.
He competed for the SA Junior World Trophy team in the 89th International Six Days’ Enduro (ISDE) and although it was only the second time the 16-year-old from Lydenburg competed internationally, he soon proved he was a force to be reckoned with.
After the third day, which was described by the jury president of the event as the worst day he had seen in his 39 years at the enduro, Brendan with his Husqvarna, was the only member left of the junior team from South Africa to continue as “fesh-fesh” (clouds of smothering, powdery dust) caused havoc and South African riders were forced to call it a day due to mechanical problems caused by the dust.
After the third day’s carnage a total of 111 competitors had retired, and a few changes to the route were implemented to prevent a repletion of the chaos. Brendan and his South African teammates Altus de Wet and Marc Torlage, both part of the World Trophy team, settled into their positions, eagerly awaiting a few more forgiving days to the end.
The South Africans kept their cool and raced hard to post competitive times while playing it safe to look after the motorcycles. Brendan managed to log in 20th after the fifth day in the E1 racing category, saying it was “a little bit technical, but not as rough as the previous days”.
He said the racing conditions were definitely something else, as they were not accustomed to riding in such sandy terrain in South Africa.
This year competitors completed almost 1 000 kilometres which excluded the total race distance of the 28 special stages and the motorcross stage on the final day. Riders spent an average of about six hours in the saddle for the first five days.
“A lot of people, including myself, underestimated the difficulty of this event by a long shot but I still had an absolute blast in Argentina and I’m over the moon about my bronze medal,” he said.
“Racing the ISDE is like racing our entire National Enduro Championship that is spread across a year, in six days. Having to work on your own bike and conserve it and yourself for the entire race makes it so hard to get to the finish.
After three days in the race you are constantly fatigued no matter what you do, but it was definitely one of my dreams come true!”
The SA World Trophy team finished 10th in its category while the Junior World Trophy team was placed ninth in the final results.
