When Andrew Mclean (RSA) and his teammate Heinz Zoerweg (AUT) crossed the finish line in the top 20 positions at this year’s Absa Cape Epic each day, they looked a lot like all the other riders finishing just ahead of or behind them.
Cycle Lab Toyta’s Heinz Zoerweg (AUT) and Andrew Mclean (RSA) celebrate their victory in the Grand Master’s category at the 2014 Absa Cape Epic. They finished a remarkable 15th overall. Photo: Sportograf
Dusty most days, muddy some days and relieved to be finished every day.
But when they removed their helmets and had a face wipe, you could see there was something different about these two men.
They were 15-25 years older than most of their rivals. Mclean, 49 and Zoerweg, 51, were racing to win the Cape Epic Grand Masters title, for riders 50-years and older, but they were mixing it among the top 20 overall in one of the toughest bike races on the planet (you become a Grand Master the year in which you turn 50).
Racing as team Cycle Lab Toyota, Mclean (RSA) and Zoerweg (AUT), only wore their team jerseys on Day one.
After that, they wore the purple jerseys of the leading Grand Masters team. Incredibly, they finished 15th overall and comfortably won the Grand Masters division.
They also won seven of the eight stages in a remarkable display of excellence and consistency and reached a high point of 12th overall on the General Classification after Stage four.
To put this into perspective, they were consistently beating around six to eight teams of Elite male professional mountain bike racers on a daily basis.
Mclean is a former road cycling professional, but has remained an active amateur racer since his retirement 15 years ago. He only met Zoerweg the day before the start of the 2014 Cape Epic, but the two were on a par in terms of strength and endurance, although Mclean concedes that wasn’t the case every day.
“Heinz is an absolute gentlemen on the bike and off it and a true pleasure to have as my partner,” said Mclean.
“I definitely held him up on the last two days. He was a machine. Definitely the strongest teammate I have ever ridden with,” said Mclean.
“Neither of us could speak the other’s home language, so we ended up communicating with a handful of words that we worked out: ‘Schnell’ (Faster); ‘Langsaam’ (Slower) and ‘No Stress’ (I am fine). I suppose you could say our actions spoke louder than any words needed to,” smiled Mclean.
Source: Cycle Lab Toyota
Read Andrew Mclean’s blog about the Absa Cape Epic here.
