SpeedMetal
Race Dog
Amageza Ride Report
Let me start off by congratulating the organisers, the amount of effort that they guys put in was evident throughout the entire event from our arrival on Friday afternoon to the awards ceremony at Jupiter on Sunday night. :thumleft:
Our trip started on Thursday night in JHB, after a major rush to finalise all the last minute items we were off around 6pm to Colesburg for a sleep over. Here’s a pic of our bikes loaded and ready for action:
First Day (Arrival and scrutineering)
We arrived in Colesburg around 1pm, shame Tannie Martie was waiting outside for us in the freezing cold to open the gate for us and then promptly kakked us out for not telling her that we had a trailer. Luckily we got it all sorted out and crashed.
We got out of Colesburg again at 5am and headed off for Sutherland, upon arrival at 2pm, we got quite a surprise when we saw everyone queuing up already fully kitted. There were little place to park so we parked in the back corner. Quickly got kitted up and took our bikes through to scrutineering. Fanie forgot his medic kit with thermal blanket so we made him one up consisting of some Panados, plasters and a rain coat but they didn’t fall for that. Luckily Alex and the guys were quite accommodating and let us through. Phew.
Afterwards we had about a half an hour to kill before our inaugural ride and photo shoot through town. Upon arriving back at the Fortuner, we wanted to move it in a more suitable position to start offloading some of the items. We promptly got stuck in the mud, in the pits and had to ask a bike with a 4x4 to come bail us out. I heard a guy comment, welcome to the Karoo mud! Still thought if that was what we were in for, we are going to have a serious challenge on our hands, and then came all the stories from the guys that did the qualifier that morning and it was apparently gruelling. By that stage I was seriously starting to stress.
The drive through town and the photo shoot was awesome, it was the first time I felt like now we are really part of something great and all the effort to get there was all worth it. Pity to hear about the guy that overcooked it in the ride through town and broke his collarbone, I could see how that was possible though as the adrenalin was very high.
Upon arrival back which was around 5pm already, Fanie realised he had a puncture and we needed to get it sorted, so whilst he did that with some help from the guys I made camp.
We then cruised through for some dinner and to get our road books. I could see the anticipation from the guys when the opened it for the first time, most of us never seen one before and besides Bluebull and Darryl ever had the opportunity to use one.
Fanie got our markers and got to it, we way over marked it, by the time we were finished it looked like a Christmas tree of all the colours. Here is a copy of Fanie’s:
Day two (Race day one)
It was quite something being woken up at 4:30am by what sounded like a sick chicken trying to rap followed by ACDC Thunderstruck. That was awesome! It really did help getting our asses out of bed and into the food hall for a brekkie before kitting up and loading the road book before departure.
Apparently it was so loud that it woke up the guys sleeping in town, us off course were the closest tent to the speaker, so we got quite a surprise on the first morning.
We all had to meet up at the exit of the school grounds at 6am for the first leg of the liaison to the starting point of the special bout 20km away. It was freezing cold but the adrenalin ran so high I don’t think anyone felt it.
I learnt quite a valuable lesson early on in the trip to mount a backlight onto my road book, I had to trust the rest of the guys as we navigated in total darkness for the first hour. Luckily by the time we started the special the sun was up already.
Day one special stage was some fantastic riding, the first half of the 60km we took it quite easy, trying to get ourselves into the navigating and keeping a semi decent pace. The terrain was mostly rocky with a couple of nice flowing stuff in between, you just had to look out for some mud holes that was like snot, one BMW rider went down hard right in front of us when it took it a bit fast through the mud and lost the front wheel. A bit further on up the first uphill I had to stop to help Robert push his bike out of the way after an animal ran in front of him and he totalled his bike and his ribs.
Tau and Andrew came flying past us, I was amazed how well he was handling that beast of his. We then got the hang of things and managed to pick up the pace again, caught up again towards the end of a very nice steep uphill section near the end. At the top we made a navigation error and went straight, Andrew did the right thing and turned right, the finish was only about a kilo down the path.
The road from there was long and tedious; the scenery was nice but a bit of a waste in personal opinion. Either way, good experience I guess for next year and beyond when we will have to travel long distances between the bouviac’s and the specials per day. We only did 400km for the day which really gives a person a real appreciation for when the guys on the Dakar has to sometimes do a 1000km per day between stages.
We managed to get back to the bouviac around 2pm which for the first time gave a bit of time to catch our breath and organise ourselves properly.
That night at dinner we heard that Rynet just got in, when she came walking into the hall everyone gave her a well-deserved applause.
Day three (race day two);
Day two was very similar to day one, we luckily started a half an hour later which allowed us to do some better navigation early on. They cut the day short to what was supposed to be a 40km liaison, 60km special and a 100km back trip. It turned out to be a 40km liaison and a 100km special. That really threw us as we couldn’t find the end of the special at the 60km mark. The first 40km was flatout stuff, Attie came past us at about 187km/h, we thought we were flying. We continued racing up to the 90km mark and then stopped. We had a chat to Rickus, he was as confused but could see the tar road below the mountain pass we were on. As Murphy would have it, about 100m further we started seeing the photographers and camera crew. The end was just down the mountain section.
Day two technical was definitely more challenging than the first day’s with a couple of serious uphill’s and step ups, if you didn’t attack it at pace you did battle. Apparently it got even worse later on in the day, the more it got rutted.
We then cruised back to town and got in around 12pm.
What was really nice for me was to firstly be part of a great event and secondly meet all the great people that were part of it. Everyone was friendly and we had a great events ceremony that night.
I will definitely be looking forward to next year’s event.
Let me start off by congratulating the organisers, the amount of effort that they guys put in was evident throughout the entire event from our arrival on Friday afternoon to the awards ceremony at Jupiter on Sunday night. :thumleft:
Our trip started on Thursday night in JHB, after a major rush to finalise all the last minute items we were off around 6pm to Colesburg for a sleep over. Here’s a pic of our bikes loaded and ready for action:
First Day (Arrival and scrutineering)
We arrived in Colesburg around 1pm, shame Tannie Martie was waiting outside for us in the freezing cold to open the gate for us and then promptly kakked us out for not telling her that we had a trailer. Luckily we got it all sorted out and crashed.
We got out of Colesburg again at 5am and headed off for Sutherland, upon arrival at 2pm, we got quite a surprise when we saw everyone queuing up already fully kitted. There were little place to park so we parked in the back corner. Quickly got kitted up and took our bikes through to scrutineering. Fanie forgot his medic kit with thermal blanket so we made him one up consisting of some Panados, plasters and a rain coat but they didn’t fall for that. Luckily Alex and the guys were quite accommodating and let us through. Phew.
Afterwards we had about a half an hour to kill before our inaugural ride and photo shoot through town. Upon arriving back at the Fortuner, we wanted to move it in a more suitable position to start offloading some of the items. We promptly got stuck in the mud, in the pits and had to ask a bike with a 4x4 to come bail us out. I heard a guy comment, welcome to the Karoo mud! Still thought if that was what we were in for, we are going to have a serious challenge on our hands, and then came all the stories from the guys that did the qualifier that morning and it was apparently gruelling. By that stage I was seriously starting to stress.
The drive through town and the photo shoot was awesome, it was the first time I felt like now we are really part of something great and all the effort to get there was all worth it. Pity to hear about the guy that overcooked it in the ride through town and broke his collarbone, I could see how that was possible though as the adrenalin was very high.
Upon arrival back which was around 5pm already, Fanie realised he had a puncture and we needed to get it sorted, so whilst he did that with some help from the guys I made camp.
We then cruised through for some dinner and to get our road books. I could see the anticipation from the guys when the opened it for the first time, most of us never seen one before and besides Bluebull and Darryl ever had the opportunity to use one.
Fanie got our markers and got to it, we way over marked it, by the time we were finished it looked like a Christmas tree of all the colours. Here is a copy of Fanie’s:
Day two (Race day one)
It was quite something being woken up at 4:30am by what sounded like a sick chicken trying to rap followed by ACDC Thunderstruck. That was awesome! It really did help getting our asses out of bed and into the food hall for a brekkie before kitting up and loading the road book before departure.
Apparently it was so loud that it woke up the guys sleeping in town, us off course were the closest tent to the speaker, so we got quite a surprise on the first morning.
We all had to meet up at the exit of the school grounds at 6am for the first leg of the liaison to the starting point of the special bout 20km away. It was freezing cold but the adrenalin ran so high I don’t think anyone felt it.
I learnt quite a valuable lesson early on in the trip to mount a backlight onto my road book, I had to trust the rest of the guys as we navigated in total darkness for the first hour. Luckily by the time we started the special the sun was up already.
Day one special stage was some fantastic riding, the first half of the 60km we took it quite easy, trying to get ourselves into the navigating and keeping a semi decent pace. The terrain was mostly rocky with a couple of nice flowing stuff in between, you just had to look out for some mud holes that was like snot, one BMW rider went down hard right in front of us when it took it a bit fast through the mud and lost the front wheel. A bit further on up the first uphill I had to stop to help Robert push his bike out of the way after an animal ran in front of him and he totalled his bike and his ribs.
Tau and Andrew came flying past us, I was amazed how well he was handling that beast of his. We then got the hang of things and managed to pick up the pace again, caught up again towards the end of a very nice steep uphill section near the end. At the top we made a navigation error and went straight, Andrew did the right thing and turned right, the finish was only about a kilo down the path.
The road from there was long and tedious; the scenery was nice but a bit of a waste in personal opinion. Either way, good experience I guess for next year and beyond when we will have to travel long distances between the bouviac’s and the specials per day. We only did 400km for the day which really gives a person a real appreciation for when the guys on the Dakar has to sometimes do a 1000km per day between stages.
We managed to get back to the bouviac around 2pm which for the first time gave a bit of time to catch our breath and organise ourselves properly.
That night at dinner we heard that Rynet just got in, when she came walking into the hall everyone gave her a well-deserved applause.
Day three (race day two);
Day two was very similar to day one, we luckily started a half an hour later which allowed us to do some better navigation early on. They cut the day short to what was supposed to be a 40km liaison, 60km special and a 100km back trip. It turned out to be a 40km liaison and a 100km special. That really threw us as we couldn’t find the end of the special at the 60km mark. The first 40km was flatout stuff, Attie came past us at about 187km/h, we thought we were flying. We continued racing up to the 90km mark and then stopped. We had a chat to Rickus, he was as confused but could see the tar road below the mountain pass we were on. As Murphy would have it, about 100m further we started seeing the photographers and camera crew. The end was just down the mountain section.
Day two technical was definitely more challenging than the first day’s with a couple of serious uphill’s and step ups, if you didn’t attack it at pace you did battle. Apparently it got even worse later on in the day, the more it got rutted.
We then cruised back to town and got in around 12pm.
What was really nice for me was to firstly be part of a great event and secondly meet all the great people that were part of it. Everyone was friendly and we had a great events ceremony that night.
I will definitely be looking forward to next year’s event.
