After four days of the eight-day race, South African stars, Matt Beers and Candice Lill are still in contention to challenge for the 2024 Absa Cape Epic Men and Women’s titles respectively. Here’s what they have in their favour…
By Sean Badenhorst
The world’s most prestigious mountain bike stage race has reached halfway in days (time) and both Beers and Lill are lying in second place in their respective races. They’re also both showing the form that indicates they’re by no means out of title contention.
After four days, the remaining 600 two-rider teams and scores of solo racers who have lost a teammate, have completed a distance of 305km with 7450 metres of climbing. The second half of the race promises to be more demanding with 312km of distance and 9150 metres of climbing! The final four days will also have a higher volume of singletrack, which is physically and mentally more demanding than jeep track, gravel and tar roads and generally favours more skilled, powerful riders.
Both Beers and Lill had to deal with wheel problems on Tuesday’s rugged Stage 2. They both lost a bit of time in the overall race, but were models of composure in how they calmly dealt with their respective difficulties under immense pressure. Beers damaged a rim and Lill sustained two punctures.
Beers and his American teammate, Howard Grotts, racing as Toyota Specialized Ninety-One, are one minute 47 seconds off the men’s race leaders after finishing second on Stage 3 from Tulbagh to Wellington on Wednesday. In the grand scheme, it’s not a big gap. The race leaders are the Buff Megamo pairing of Wout Allemans, the European champion and Hans Becking, the Dutch champion. After three strong days, Allemans admitted he felt some fatigue on Wednesday’s fast-paced transition stage.
Two of the three title contender favourites lost time in the first half of the race – the Germans Georg Egger and Lukas Baum (Orbea Leatt Speed Company) and Nino Schurter and Sebastian Fini (World Bicycle Relief). Egger and Baum had a mechanical on Stage 2, but have struggled to find race sharpness simultaneously thus far. With two podium finishes in the last two stages though, they do appear to riding into form and will no doubt launch their trademark maverick-style attacks in the second half in an effort to claw back some of their 7:21 deficit.
Schurter and Fini led the race overall for the first three days and their time loss came from mechanicals on Stages 2 and 3, with Fini sustaining a puncture on Stage 2 and then experiencing chain problems on Stage 3. Like Egger and Baum, they will need look for opportunities to regain some of the 3:47 they find themselves down.
Lill is teamed up with the current Marathon World Champion, Mona Mitterwallner of Austria. Competing as Cannondale Factory Racing, the pair had two below-par days while Mitterwallner recovered from mild illness and then had to deal with Lill’s punctures on Day 3. They were outdistanced in the final 10km on Wednesday’s stage by the current leaders, Anne Terpstra and Nicole Koller, losing over a minute in the overall race. They are now 2:29 off the lead with four days of racing to come.
Thursday’s Stage 4 is the Queen Stage – an 88km distance with a monstrous 3000 metres of climbing. At 70km with 1750 metres of ascent, Friday’s Stage 5 offers some respite before two huge final days of singletrack-heavy racing around Stellenbosch – Stage 6 has 87km and 2400m of ascent and Stage 7 has 67km and 2000m of climbing!
Both Beers and Lill have the experience, temperament, form, teammate pedigree and team support to turn the second half of the 2024 Cape Epic in their favour. They also have something in their favour that their rivals don’t, intimate knowledge of the remaining route and the relentless support of the host country. Whether or not they manage to move from second to first between now and Sunday, the second half of this year’s race is going to be Epic-er!
