Potchefstroom Girls High must be proud of its newest history maker in the form of a young Grade 8 pupil who loves to ride and win on her mountain bike.

Andrea de Waal is the first mountain biker in the 110 year history of the school and recently crushed her competition when she became the North West Sub Junior Series Winner in the prestigious Spur High School MTB Series.

Andrea won all three events in the series and completely dominated her North-West rivals. She now has shifted all her focus on the High School National Finals that takes place at Bekker High School from 3-4 October. “I am working really hard this week to be at my best form for Sunday’s finals,” she explained.

Earlier this year in Parys on 12 September, she also won the North West Sub Junior Girls Marathon Champion’s Jersey. On top of that Andrea is also the High School, Sub Junior Girls, Eliminator Champion. Even though she has a string of accomplishments to her name, she still feels that this should only make her practice harder to keep up her good work on the bike.

“I started mountain biking because my dad has always had a passion for cycling. He encouraged my younger brother and I to give it a try, which I did and then the bug bit! Now I can’t stay off my bike. That was 2 years ago,” she said.Andrea has had a really good racing season so far this year. She has participated in 19 races, had 13 wins, 3 second places, 2 third places and 1 fourth place.

This also includes a brilliant fourth place as SA XCO Champs that was held in Cape Town this year.“My favourite part of riding is the technical parts – it truly gets my adrenalin going and I just love the drops and gap jumps, it makes me feel alive,” she enthused. She also added that her win in Pietermaritzburg earlier in the year has been one of her highlights on a bike.

“This happened because I have the most awesome coach (Frans van der Berg of Team Daly) who helped me to be at top form and helped me to be prepared for the track on race day,” she expressed.