Rory Mapstone and Rex Benson won their second stage on the trot to take overall honours in the men’s section of the three-day Liberty Waterberg Encounter mountain bike race at Sondela Nature Reserve near Bela-Bela in Limpopo on 11 June 2017.<\/p>\n
The Bestmed Masters team completed the 59km final stage, which included 920m of ascent, in 2:19:52 to lift the title in 7:36:27.<\/p>\n
Gauteng Dairy’s Charles Steyn and Ian McLeod, who won stage one, finished runners-up on the final day in 2:24:11 to consolidate their second place in the standings in 7:41:38.<\/p>\n
Last year’s champion, Gertjie Harmse, who rode with his brother Louis in the colours of SS Timing-ASG, completed the day’s podium in 2:24:59 to seal the same place in the general classification in 7:54:09.<\/p>\n
Mapstone and Benson, who trailed Steyn and McLeod by just over a minute after the first day, made the most of a technical section around 6km into the 51km second stage to surge into the lead.<\/p>\n
“We got away going down a big rocky decent and just kept our heads down,” said Mapstone, who is from Pretoria.<\/p>\n
“When we came out at the bottom, we couldn’t see the guys so we decided if they want to catch up they must work for it.”<\/p>\n
He said they were able to keep their advantage on the course that started and finished at Elements Private Golf Estate and included 1 054m of vertical climbing to move into the overall lead heading into the final day.<\/p>\n
The last stage of the Liberty Waterkloof Encounter, in partnership with STANLIB, had been challenging but enjoyable after a tough start to the event, admitted Mapstone.<\/p>\n
“I didn’t feel marvellous on Friday, with my legs cramping, but I felt good today and was able to set the pace.”<\/p>\n
Their only scare came around 15km from the finish when they veered off course.<\/p>\n
They were able to rectify their mistake quickly and pushed hard towards the end to remain ahead of Steyn and McLeod, whose challenged faltered after suffering a puncture.<\/p>\n
Benson, who also lives in Pretoria, said they were lucky not to have lost more time on the opening day.<\/p>\n
“We were very fortunate on day one. Rory damaged a link on his chain during the stage, which we only discovered at the end.”<\/p>\n
They were able to replace the chain overnight and, according to him, were free of any further mechanicals during the race.<\/p>\n
In the mixed section, Team Bestmed-ASG’s Sanet Coetzee and Anton Smal cruised to victory in all three stages to take the title in 7:41:26.<\/p>\n
“I thought it was going to be an easy ride, based on the short distances, but got a bit of a rude awakening when we tackled the course,” said Coetzee.<\/p>\n
“Day two was exceptionally difficult. I thought it would be easy because it was just 51km, but it must have been one of the hardest 51km I have ever ridden.”<\/p>\n
The women’s race was won by the Woolworths pairing of Reinette Geldenhuis and Phryne Williams in 10:57:08.<\/p>\n
Overall results:<\/p>\n
Men<\/p>\n
1. Rex Benson & Rory Mapstone (Bestmed Masters) 7:36:27
\n2. Charles Steyn & Ian McLeod (Gauteng Dairy) 7:41:38
\n3. Gertjie Harmse & Louis Harmse (SS Timing-ASG) 7:54:09
\n4. Neil Vlaming & Nicholas Cooke (Quick Fix) 8:05:33
\n5. Pieter Seyffert & Johann Seyffert (Ellsworth-ASG) 8:11:14
\n6. Hanco Kachelhoffer & Don Kohne (Ellsworth) 8:15:40
\n7. Garth de Jager & Kevin Walter (Beers & Gears) 8:19:34
\n8. Gary Cloete & James Ross-Marsh (Caffeine Kung Fu) 8:33:03
\n9. Johan Claasen & Shaun Botha (Nautical Mile) 8:40:28
\n10. Albertus Jooste & Justin van der Linde (Mad Buddies) 8:48:21<\/p>\n
Mixed<\/p>\n
1. Sanet Coetzee & Anton Smal (Bestmed-ASG) 7:41:26
\n2. Alta Kriegler & Hein Prinsloo (W2W) 9:14:36
\n3. Nicky Booyens & Gerrard Booyens (Mutual Safes) 9:57:04<\/p>\n
Women<\/p>\n
1. Reinette Geldenhuis & Phryne Williams (Woolworths) 10:57:08<\/p>\n
Stage 3 results:<\/p>\n
Men<\/p>\n
1. Rex Benson & Rory Mapstone (Bestmed Masters) 2:19:52
\n2. Charles Steyn & Ian McLeod (Gauteng Dairy) 2:24:11
\n3. Gertjie Harmse & Louis Harmse (SS Timing-ASG) 2:24:59<\/p>\n
Mixed<\/p>\n
1. Sanet Coetzee & Anton Smal (Bestmed-ASG) 2:19:50
\n2. Alta Kriegler & Hein Prinsloo (W2W) 2:48:59
\n3. Nicky Booyens & Gerrard Booyens (Mutual Safes) 2:58:27<\/p>\n
Women<\/p>\n
1. Reinette Geldenhuis & Phryne Williams (Woolworths) 3:21:49<\/p>\n
Stage 2 results:<\/p>\n
Men<\/p>\n
1. Rex Benson & Rory Mapstone (Bestmed Masters) 2:25:07
\n2. Charles Steyn & Ian McLeod (Gauteng Dairy) 2:27:19
\n3. Gertjie Harmse & Louis Harmse (SS Timing-ASG) 2:30:54<\/p>\n
Mixed<\/p>\n
1. Sanet Coetzee & Anton Smal (Bestmed-ASG) 2:30:54
\n2. Alta Kriegler & Hein Prinsloo (W2W) 3:01:10
\n3. Nicky Booyens & Gerrard Booyens (Mutual Safes) 3:07:37<\/p>\n
Women<\/p>\n
1. Reinette Geldenhuis & Phryne Williams (Woolworths) 3:35:50<\/p>\n
Stage 1 results:<\/p>\n
Men<\/p>\n
1. Charles Steyn & Ian McLeod (Gauteng Dairy) 2:50:08
\n2. Rex Benson & Rory Mapstone (Bestmed Masters) 2:51:28
\n3. Gertjie Harmse & Louis Harmse (SS Timing-ASG) 2:52:38<\/p>\n
Mixed<\/p>\n
1. Sanet Coetzee & Anton Smal (Bestmed-ASG) 2:50:42
\n2. Leandre Gouws & Chris van der Merwe (Rookies) 3:31:48
\n3. Ashley Seller & Graham Hannigan 3:33:20<\/p>\n
Women<\/p>\n
1. Tracey Reynolds & Sharon Spiller (Spiller Sisters) 4:40:35<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Rory Mapstone and Rex Benson won their second stage on the trot to take overall honours in the men’s section of the three-day Liberty Waterberg Encounter mountain bike race at Sondela Nature Reserve near Bela-Bela in Limpopo on 11 June 2017. The Bestmed Masters team completed the 59km final stage, which included 920m of ascent, […]<\/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":[3],"tags":[1743,2633,2594,2634,2326,1944,2115,1945,2654,2653,2652,2651,2655,2597],"class_list":["post-6789","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-more-sport","tag-asg-events","tag-bela-bela","tag-liberty-waterberg-encounter","tag-limpopo","tag-limpopo-news","tag-mountain-bike","tag-mountain-bike-news","tag-mountain-bike-race","tag-phryne-williams","tag-reinette-geldenhuis","tag-rex-benson","tag-rory-mapstone","tag-sondela-nature-reserve","tag-waterberg-encounter"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6789","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=6789"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6789\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6789"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6789"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6789"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}