Cycle classic a success

This year’s Paratus Namibian Cycle Classic was inclusive and appealed equally to sport, adventure, and fun enthusiasts.

Welcomed as a radically reinvigorated post-Covid-19 calendar fixture, the Cycle Classic notched up 1 086 entrants - an increase of over 10% on the last event held in 2021 from all over Namibia.

The two-day event, which ran from 8 to 9 October, included a kiddies’ race, a 50 km mountain bike and a 100 km road race, along with a vast array of new features such as livestreaming of the results and a giant screen at the finish line, plus a wide variety of food and entertainment stands for everyone to enjoy.

Diversity

The technical organiser of the event, Pierre du Plooy, said the entries reflected people’s willingness to come out and play and compete again.

"It was wonderful to see people coming together and enjoying themselves. The fact that several milestones were created in terms of the numbers, the diversity of participation, and the overall positive response, means that we have raised the bar on this event."

Du Plooy added that so many records were broken with the event this year.

‘‘It’s great that so many impaired people took part and that our numbers increased – for example, there were 35% more women in the 100 km road race; we had a 20% increase in the children’s race and many more entrants overall. People just want to participate and have fun.

Everyone wins

‘‘The vendors that took part were similarly delighted with the outcome, and of course, we also created a whole raft of temporary jobs around the event – for example, all our medals this year were all handmade by Hans Kolberg. The good news just goes on and on, and we couldn’t do any of this without the major support of this sporting event from Paratus," he added.

"Paratus has helped by giving the necessary might and technological support required to take the event to a new level. We are very grateful not only to Paratus but also to The Namibian, to the City Police in Windhoek, and to the two cycle shops, Mannie’s Bike Mecca and Cycletec, which both did so much to ensure the participants’ safety," Du Plooy said.

Paratus Namibia managing director, Andrew Hall, who took part in the race, said it was their first race in a three-year sponsorship agreement, ‘‘and we look forward to working closely with Rotary and all the various stakeholders to make the Paratus Namibian Cycle Classic an even better event in the future. We could see how much people love this event and want to participate and we can only grow this and appeal to even more people next year,’’ he concluded.