Fast start leads Miller to win

A hot and sunny day at Farm Windhoek in Kleine Kuppe made for some challenging mountain biking at the Nedbank UCI Class One cross-country event on Saturday.

Up against reigning South African champion Philip Buys as his main competitor in the race for UCI world ranking points, Alex Miller’s home advantage and his strategy of a blistering fast opening lap yielded results as he won the 33-kilometre elite men’s race.

Completing the first of seven laps almost a minute faster than the average of the rest of his laps, the Namibian champion and 2022 Commonwealth bronze medallist sped away from his opposition early and held on to win by about 90 seconds against Buys and his fellow South African, Johan van Zyl.

“With this being a Class One event with 60 points available (to the winner), that’s a lot of points if you go race overseas, so I’m very happy with the result,” Miller said afterwards.

“Having Philip and the other South Africans here doesn’t make things easy and although I managed my goal of a fast first lap, it was still a tough race.”

Buys said: “I suffered quite a bit on this course. It feels like the air is quite dry, so Alex really had me on the first lap already. I just had to settle into my own pace and surviving out there.

"It’s been a nice trip to Namibia and I’m happy with the UCI points.”

Van Zyl secured third position in front of Namibian Hugo Hahn, who held off the challenge of South Africans Luke Moir and Daniel van der Walt.



Elite women

Namibia’s upcoming 20-year-old Monique du Plessis hung on for a valuable third position in the elite women’s race behind the experienced South African riders Candice Lill and Tyler Jacobs.

Lill, a bronze medalllist at the Commonwealth Games last year, was in a class of her own, winning by two minutes ahead of Jacobs, with Du Plessis finishing the five laps about seven minutes behind Lill, followed by Nicola Fester.

The junior women’s race had only two competitors, with Ada Kahl (SA) winning ahead of Eden Spangenberg (Namibia).



Junior men

The junior men’s race saw Massimiliano Ambrosi of South Africa winning narrowly against Namibia’s Daniel Hahn. After these two rode at the front for most of the race, Hahn’s back wheel slid from under him around the final corner, erasing his hopes of a sprint challenge to the line.

In his first race after recovering from a broken wrist five weeks ago, he showed encouraging form, while his teammate Kevin Lowe felt the effect of an illness from last week and could not keep up the pace.

Ernest Roets, reigning South African and continental junior champion, finished third, two minutes behind Daniel.