This past weekend saw some of the finest mountain bikers pedal their way to glory at the 2018 SA Mountain Bike Cross Country (XCO) Championships in Bloemfontein on Saturday, 21 July.
Potchefstroom’s mountain bike trailblazers once again hit high gear on the national stage with a couple of superb podium and top-5 places in their respective categories.
Danielle Strydom was the pick of the bunch with her second place in the u.23 women’s section in a time of 1:42:06. This was her first u.23 race at the national championships and emotions and nerves were there before the race to keep her going.
‘The race was very interesting as I fell a couple of times and had to run to the finish line after I got a puncture on the last lap. In moments like these, you can do nothing but accept it,’ she said.
‘For the first half of the course, I was feeling surprisingly good and then, unfortunately, I lost ground on the climb. Then I fell on the downhill hairpin, which was very technical, and that made it difficult to catch up to the leader, Bianca Haw,’ she added.
After her fall, Strydom was a bit frazzled as she could not get back into the race, falling a couple more times during the second part of the race.

‘The track was really technical but the weather was actually very nice on the day. I am still really chuffed with my second place, even though I had to go through a lot of things in the race. The most important thing is how you adapt,’ she added.

Pieter du Toit also just missed out on a podium position with a fourth place in the men’s u.23 section in a time of 1:36:55. He could not haul in Jarrod van den Heever in third place who kept the Potchefstroom cyclist at bay until the finish.
‘The race was really technical and I had to do six laps in my category. It went really well, especially since I had a tough start, to begin with. I moved through the field and ended 40 seconds behind the third placed rider,’ said Du Toit.

Potchefstroom Gimnasium’s Joné van Eeden was also at her very best in Bloem and took the second place in the youth women’s category. This petite rider has now shown her class time and time again and is currently flying the flag for school cycling in Potch.
‘It was a hard, technical race with a number of climbs, jumps and rock gardens that really kept things interesting,’ she said.