02 Jul 2014

John Grobler was crowned the winner of the Tantebane cycling challenge recently after coming first in the 50km category.

The cycling event, which attracted a lot of participants from the greater Francistown area and others from afar, was held at the Tantebane Golf Resort on June 28.

Charles Biron came second while Gerald Swennerton came third. In the ladies event, Gretha Van de Merwe came first followed by Joe-Ann Grobler and Elzani Verwey respectively. The 20km challenge was won by 14-year-old Hano Viljoen followed by Dion Frost and Kobus Bezudenhout respectively.

The Tantebane challenge was the first event where the cycling and the golf challenge were held together in one day. Last year, the event only consisted of the 9 hole golf challenge.

In an interview, the event organiser, Hannies Pheiffer, the dealer principal at Francistown Toyota said this was the first time they tried to get more people involved in both cycling and golf.

Also, he said that they wanted to introduce their businesses to participants.
On the format of the event, he highlighted that they wanted more families to get involved in both golf and cycling to develop awareness on both sports from Francistowners.

Pheiffer also mentioned that getting people involved in sport and exercise was a good undertaking as it contributed to their health and well-being. “Next year,we want to have children participating in both events as this is good for families,” he said. He said the performance of the participants was very impressive and noted that people came in large numbers and also applauded the youth for their good showing in the challenge but encouraged them to prepare well before they could participate.

Consequently, he noted that both cycling and golf were growing sports in Francistown in terms of popularity and performance.

As a company, he mentioned that Francistown Toyota was playing its part in terms of sports development. Sports, he added was good for the health of the community and urged people to take it up as a way of improving their health.

He also thanked other sponsors who came on board such as Capital Bank and Security Services.

Next year, Pheiffer explained, many companies want to get involved in the event, adding that for them this was a way to thank customers who did business with them. ENDS