Etnard Louw, who placed second behind Charles McFall at last year’s One Tonner, is aiming for another podium spot when he lines up for this year’s edition in Stellenbosch on Sunday.
The 32-year-old said their Mad Macs team could not make up a full squad for the 170km team race and the individual event was considered a fun ride, so they had again entered the 109km event.
“It went great [last year]. On the opening climb the team managed to ride away with a few others who couldn’t keep up with the pace after a while and five of the team time-trialled to the finish,” said Louw.
Mad Macs’ Etnard Louw is aiming for another podium placing when he competes in the One Tonner in Stellenbosch on Sunday. Photo: Facebook/Etnard Louw
Louw said he felt excited about this weekend’s race and was again targeting a top placing.
From last year’s race he said he had learnt that is was necessary to take it easy over the first 50km.
“As soon as you turn onto the Malmesbury road it is a block headwind and if you spend too much energy up to that point then you’re going to run out of it,” he said.
Louw added that fitness-wise he felt great and he hoped his legs would be well rested and fresh on the day.
“We’ll go as hard as possible on the climb to get rid of riders who wouldn’t work with the group and from there set a steady tempo. Hopefully some team tactics will get rid of anyone still in the group coming back into the wind.”
He felt a big factor in the race was hitting Helshoogte “basically on 0km”. “On cold legs you can easily lose contact.”
Louw added the other main section was coming back into a headwind or crosswind. If you ran out of energy there you quickly lost a lot of time.
“I think the route suits me well though. The opening climb is good for me and I can keep a steady pace coming back into the wind.”
What he enjoyed about the event was that it was well organised and well attended. “It’s luckily not too hard for a race that’s closer to the end of the season, but it’s also always good to test if the guys still have some form left.”
Louw will line up alongside teammates Greg de Vink, Matthew Keyser, Max Sullivan, Shaun Glover, Rocco King and Alex Heward.
“We’ll set a high pace, especially from the start, and then maybe send a few guys up the road to put pressure on other riders and let them do the chasing.”
Overall, Louw felt it had been a great year. He and the team had competed in races he had not done before, which was always good.
“The Tour of Maurice was definitely a big highlight for me, together with the Cape Pioneer Trek.
“Generally I had great form and contributed a lot to the team, as well as landing podiums here and there. So I’m happy with how the season played out.”
Next year he hoped to do the rest of the races he had not participated in yet, such as sani2c and Tankwa Trek.
“I’m also excited to team up with Matthew Keyser for some mountain-bike stage races.”
