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14 Mar 2023

Three of Cycle4Life cycling club members Kagiso Potongwane, Themba Giddie and Lesego Osman will be volunteering at the 2023 Absa Cape Epic mountain biking series in Cape Town South Africa.

Absa Cape Epic 2023 edition will return to the northern trails of Cape Town for a prologue this Sunday, running until March 26.

The mountain bike challenge will see cyclists from all over the world riding 658 km with 15 775m of Cape Town climbs.

Successful and smooth delivery of an event the size of Absa Cape Epic cycling challenge depends on determination and will of volunteers to ensure that participants and competitors are able to experience all of the Cape Epic, termed Untamed African Mountain Bike Race, has to offer.

Volunteering in this event comes with huge learnings, especially for the local cycling sport.

A lot is needed to put together the race of this magnitude.

The race provides insights such as race start and finish logistics, timing, support of cyclists before, during and at the end of the event and most critically during the race as anything can happen in this stage of such an intense challenge.

There is likelihood of injuries among cyclists, how logistics with regards to health have been penned out, the responses and contact hospitals and/or health specialists, hydrations for riders and just how every cyclists are to be taken care of is of utmost importance.

Safety and security is important in such a race, as there is possible interaction with nature since riders will be pedaling in areas that are not human populated and chances of bumping with nature in its wildest form are a possibility.

It goes without saying that a cycling challenge such as Absa Cape Epic comes with media coverage.

Insights into coverage footage, especially television, particularly live coverage, logistics put in place to facilitate such livestransmission.

Therefore all these could be of great benefit to improving local cycling space.

After eight days, Potongwane, Giddie and Osman will bring back home huge insights into the organisation and delivery of a successful cycling challenge.

“We saw this as a great opportunity to further advance our knowledge in the space of cycling events administration and organising,” Potongwane noted.

Botswana Cycling Association (BCA) president, Potongwane indicated that experiencing a full service stage race as volunteers, will allow them to learn almost all aspects of putting together a similar event.

He said they attended a virtual workshop for the programme prior to the event ‘and learnt a lot already, so we look forward to more learnings.’
Potongwane, who first applied for the programme in 2021 and got admitted this year, noted that the programme would come in handy for his role as the association’s president for planning future BCA events, including any major events that they may facilitate as a sporting code in the future.

“The opportunity will also allow me to broaden my networking with administrators, riders and organisers of cycling events from across the world, after which I will gladly share my experience and learnings for the benefit of local riders, administrators and general cycling community in Botswana,” he stated.

For Cycle4Life cycling club, the programme will help in enhancing and improving the local mountain biking races through involvement in race organising.

Cycle4Life main focus is mountain biking discipline and one of their race events include the popular Dimension Data Route 73, which locally is described as the toughest one-day mountain bike race.

Volunteering in the Absa Cape Epic challenge guarantees volunteers an entry into the following year’s race event. Although it is a gruesome cycling challenge, Potongwane said they were excited to take on the challenge.

“We are excited about the opportunity to ride next year, which is a special benefit for all volunteers,” he said enthusiastically.

He said the race was challenging for amateur athletes, but indicated that with their training routine back home ‘we will need to do a lot of adjustments and learn new techniques to improve our performance and get to a fitness level that will allow us to complete the race challenge next year. And we intend to do just that.’ ENDS