Five-time Cape Epic winner Karl Platt announced that this will be his final year as a professional at the eight-day mountain bike stage race that starts on March 15.
Karl Platt and Alban Lakata will team up for their second Cape Epic together when the eight-day mountain bike stage race starts on March 15. Photo: Nick Muzik/Cape Epic
The German, who won the first ever edition in 2004 alongside Mannie Heymans, has in 17 years never missed an Epic and has 15 finishes to his name.
“The Epic became a part of my life and South Africa my second home. There are so many reasons to come back; I just love it,” said Platt, who will team up with Austria’s Alban Lakata for the second time. The pair placed 12th overall last year.
“The Epic is hard to predict because the teams and the route change with every edition,” said the 40-year-old Lakata.
“As always though we try do our best in terms of preparation for the race. Then, hopefully, we will start with a smooth prologue. After that we’ll take it day by day.
“With Team Bulls we are in the luxurious situation of having two teams going for a top general classification result.
“Plus [we have] a super strong supporter team for back-up. We will see which of the top teams will shift into the supporter role as the race unfolds,” said Lakata, referring to fellow Bulls riders Urs Huber, Simon Stiebjahn, Martin Frey and Simon Schneller.
The 41-year-old Platt said he and Lakata had very different training styles but their thinking about the race were very much the same.
“We’ve built a true friendship and understand each other very well and I think this is a key to success.”
Lakata added that the past year had been important in that it had enabled him to get to know Platt and the team better.
“The Epic, in particular, needs a strong and close friendship with your partner to be successful. What we both learnt from last year was that we have to trust in our experience. To us that means that we should go our own way in terms of preparation for the 2020 race.
“Now, based on that, I believe we can do much better than in 2019.”
