Besides being a prime competitor with 18 titles under her belt, Port Elizabeth star Anriette Schoeman is revelling in her role as ambassador of the long-running Lorraine Cycle Tour.<\/p>\n
The 20th edition of what has become a PE institution will be held at Lorraine Primary School on Saturday and the 42-year-old Schoeman is ready to take her place among the podium contenders.<\/p>\n
However, she admitted this week that she was suffering from “a bit of a cold”, but was hoping it would not affect her performance.<\/p>\n
“I am always keen for this race,” said Schoeman, “although I am not sure if I will be firing on all pistons. I’m hoping to shake this cold off before Saturday.”<\/p>\n
Sponsored by African Bank, Mecer and Strada, the tour has a feature race of 80km and also offers distances of 50km and 30km.<\/p>\n
Schoeman’s entry into the main race, however, is just one aspect of the occasion as the seven-time Cape Town Cycle Tour winner has become the face of the PE event.<\/p>\n
Her role as race ambassador continues a long-standing connection with the tour and Lorraine Primary School, who have a strong cycling ethos in their development programme.<\/p>\n
“I really do respect what this tour brings to Port Elizabeth because it always connects with projects via the school and gives back to the community,” she said.<\/p>\n
“Although I never went there, Lorraine Primary is very close to my heart.<\/p>\n
“I try to assist the children wherever I can, whether it be giving them some advice or assisting with equipment and cycling kit.”<\/p>\n
Schoeman added that providing opportunities for young enthusiasts to take part in the sport was an uplifting experience.<\/p>\n
“Some don’t have the means to buy the best equipment, but when you give them a chance to experience cycling and see how their faces light up you realise what it means to them.<\/p>\n
“It helps from a holistic point of view, because it’s a wonderful outlet for them. Even if they don’t become world champions it promotes a healthy and active lifestyle.”<\/p>\n
She felt it was all about planting the seed at an early age because often young children didn’t know what their life path would be.<\/p>\n
“But if they can achieve something by being exposed to the sport, for example a university bursary, then it is mission accomplished.”<\/p>\n
The defending champion said the cycle tour was a celebration of the sport in the city.<\/p>\n
“It is a really nice day and a festival of fun, not only for the riders, but also for supporters and spectators.<\/p>\n
“The race is well organised and there is a great vibe and amazing lucky-draw prizes, so it’s always a good one to support.”<\/p>\n
Tour director Alex Cooper said they appreciated the support they had received from the former Olympian, who has also attended three Commonwealth Games.<\/p>\n
“As a top professional, Anriette has never left Port Elizabeth, even though she faced some tough challenges in competing at the highest level,” he said.<\/p>\n
“She has been a real ambassador for us, as well as PE, and is an icon to many in the cycling fraternity of the region.”<\/p>\n
The 80km race will start at 7am on Saturday, followed by the 50km at 7.15am and the 30km event at 7.30am.<\/p>\n
There will also be a fun walk, expected to attract around 500 people.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Besides being a prime competitor with 18 titles under her belt, Port Elizabeth star Anriette Schoeman is revelling in her role as ambassador of the long-running Lorraine Cycle Tour. The 20th edition of what has become a PE institution will be held at Lorraine Primary School on Saturday and the 42-year-old Schoeman is ready to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":58746,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3260],"tags":[2122,1788,4896,30],"class_list":["post-32975","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-anriette-schoeman","tag-cycling-news","tag-lorraine-cycle-tour","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32975","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32975"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32975\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32975"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32975"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32975"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}