LENZ: DC with Cycle Club Lenasia (CCL)

‘Do you want to DC with Cycling Club Lenasia this year?’

Heinrich WhatsApp’d me to ask if I wanted to join team CCL or Cycling Club Lenasia for the Old Mutual Wealth Double Century 200km race around Swellendam this year. It required a quick YES or NO because the entries/substitutions closed that same day. The answer was obvious. Let’s go!

*Sidenote: I have only done it once before, on a MTB, and swore never to make that silly mistake again. But we were indeed taking the MTB’s to cycle from Stellenbosch to Swellendam and back, so I sent my boxed road bike directly to the guest house, using this very #bicyclecouriers service, off course. Admin sorted, we joined the Cycling Club Lenasia and this is how it went…

Super-organized

The LENZ guys were extremely efficient and very professional, having done this before. They had an A and B team and flew down to CPT, having organized transport and soigneurs and meals and accommodation and kit (we certainly looked the part and received many compliments on the team colours). One team stayed in town and the other at Bontebok park just outside Swellendam.

A laugh-a-minute

The chaps we clearly a close-knit group and there was banter all around and all the time. I nearly fell over laughing as we ascended Tradouws pass and someone shouted, “OUPA – release the brakes!”. And so it continued all the way to the finish line, for which everyone promptly received a well-deserved Charles Milner medal for crossing the finish line at the same time. Teamwork.

Respect

With Heinrich and myself being the only two token Afrikaans guys in this all Indian outfit, I was expecting to burp a flame from spicy food before the weekend was out, but it seems next time we should turn up the heat. Jokes aside, what struck me was how well the younger members in the group respected their elders, and their exemplary sense of unity. We should follow suite. And I hope to share their company again somewhere down the line — open invite: why not come and cycle Tourdeboland with us, next year before the Argus?

Dankie team CCL!

Many thanks to everyone for a top cycling weekend — H, Suliman, Moosa, Ibraheem, Cassim, Yusuf, Mohammed, Yogesh, Ebrahim, Zubair, MY, Masood, Muaaz, Kamlesh, Hemant, Anant, Ziyaad, Mukesh, Muhammed, Aadil, Prakash, and our resident advocate Mzu.

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Someone said we need therapy. But the cycling is the therapy.