CapeEpic Stage 3

Niclas: Welcome to the Afasteryou Podcast, where it's all about endurance sports and training. Here Sebastian Schluricke, Björn Kafka and Niclas Ranker share valuable tips and insights to help you take your performance to the next level. Alright, a warm welcome to a new episode of the Afasteryou Podcast, Cape Epic 2025. Today was Stage 3, Day 4. And it was hot. It was really hot. Because the organizers already knew this the day before, the start was moved forward by a quarter of an hour. On top of that, the stage was shortened to 76 kilometers and a listed 2400 meters of elevation. Originally it was 90 kilometers and 2600 meters of elevation. I myself measured 2100 meters of elevation — hard enough. On the shuttle ride, the Garmin was already showing 25 degrees at 6 AM, when it was still dark and the sun was slowly coming up. At its peak, the Garmin measured at least 39 degrees. But I suspect that in some spots, depending on where the sun was, it definitely felt like over 40. When you rode into it, yeah, the whole day basically felt like an oven. It was really intense today. Then the stage itself. It was all in Paarl, and in Paarl you rode more or less around one mountain. From the start, you briefly left the Cape Epic venue. And went pretty much straight into the first climb. That one had three kilometers right off the bat and was really punchy and steep. Ten percent on average. As always, there were a few flat sections here and there. But basically, that one was really steep. This morning I rode up it at 350 watts NP and 338 average. That was, for me at least, the slowest I could ride with my 38-tooth chainring. My partner wasn't quite as fast, so I had to wait a bit for him near the top. But that wasn't a problem at all — overall we were able to position ourselves really well. The first descent was a really cool trail too. I definitely picked up a thorn somewhere, or a thorn from the day before flew out of my tire, and I lost air on the first descent. I noticed it right away on the second climb, where it went up through switchbacks again. I communicated that to my partner, said, hey, I'm going to stop briefly, put some air in with a CO2 cartridge, and catch back up. Because I'd noticed, okay, I lost air on the descent, but it held during the first part of the climb. And then I deliberately said, okay, I'm stopping here, you keep going, I'll add air. Then that was sorted out and I was able to close the gap back to him pretty quickly. I rode 400 watts for two minutes. Then there was a short intermediate descent on tarmac, and by the end of the tarmac descent I had caught back up to him. So that was relatively relaxed for us and didn't really cost us any time. Got lucky there. After that we went into another next climb, which was very relaxed, just a wide jeep track. There we caught up with the Grandmasters team, who had the leader jersey, and went over the climb together with them. Then came a new descent and then it kept going. Into the first really long climb. Before that, at the bottom, there was another waterpoint. There we topped up our bottles for the first time — that was around kilometer 20, right at one hour of racing. We had deliberately not taken anything from the hydration pack yet. So we had a two-liter hydration pack with us. Plus I had two more 750-milliliter bottles on the bike, and Juri had another half-liter each. Since he rides an M frame, no more than a half-liter fits in the back. And he could run a big one up front, but he went with two 500ml bottles. And then we headed into the first long climb. And it was really — I think you could see it in the stream too — a lot of teams were really struggling. It was really steep again. It went 3.3 kilometers up on jeep track and averaged 11%. At that point, it was already 30 degrees on the climb. So that's where it really started getting tough. For me and my partner for sure. For Juri, actually a pretty good climb. At that point we were in a group of three with the leaders from the Grandmasters and the team that was still ahead of us in the GC at that point, Honeycomb. And I deliberately pushed Juri a lot there because we knew, okay, there's still a lot to come, the day will be long. When it's on a jeep track, I can push well. I can help him a lot there. When it's on singletrack and you're riding single file, I can't help. And here on the jeep track I was able to help quite well. Over the 21-minute climb I put down 323 NP and 317 average, with peaks of 685 watts. Um... That was definitely good for us because Juri could — he would have ridden the pace on his own too, but he could save a bit of energy, which I think definitely gave us an advantage later on. Then came the first trail, also really cool. It went through — this time not just those marble-run sections, not just built-up switchbacks the whole time, but also a few rocky passages. That was really fun. However, you have to say, from that point on it was almost exclusively downhill, with little counter-rollers here and there, but it was really 14 kilometers of trail in one stretch. The whole time up, down, but tending downhill overall. But over those 14 kilometers we still did 121 meters of climbing and lost 425 meters. And the whole thing cost us, for example, 42 minutes. The temperature was climbing to 33 degrees by then, so it was slowly getting, I'd say, uncomfortable. And Juri made a really good move, because we saw that the Grandmasters team was a bit behind us. Then two Brazilians came up from behind and started pushing pressure on. And we were behind the Honeycomb team. And the Honeycomb team kept — on little counter-rollers, or you often had to ride technical sections, over a small rock field basically, over a few stones and bigger roots. And one of them kept unclipping and having problems. And then on the counter-climbs, whenever there were switchbacks, they had problems too and would partly — in those tight corners, in those uphill berm-style corners — unclip and briefly walk. And that cost us time. Juri picked up on that pretty quickly. And the last three kilometers were only trail, downhill to the next waterpoint. Juri then made a quick attack, moved past on the trail quickly. I was able to follow pretty directly, pushed my way past too. And then I think in the last three kilometers we opened up 20 or 30 seconds on the descent — he really let it run. Then we were first at the waterpoint and could immediately fill both our bottles. And could then, of course, be first out of the waterpoint and just calmly raise our pace into the next climb. That was really cool for us. The climb then went two kilometers. I rode around 300 watts there, 111 meters of elevation. It went well. After that, the climb was back to just on trails. And then came the funny phase. We were about two hours 43 into the race. 50 kilometers done. We were back up to 33, 34 degrees. And then basically from kilometer 50 to kilometer 60 it was all uphill. Only trails, 10 kilometers long. It just kept winding the whole time. So it went up a bit, it went down a bit. Lots of switchbacks over loose stones, over fixed stones. And the temperature on this climb had risen to 38 and 39 degrees by now. Garmin measured. I think the thermometers in Paarl showed peaks of over 40 degrees. On that climb — 10 kilometers, 420 meters of elevation, 3.5 percent average — we only rode up at 254 NP and 224 watts average. But it just kept getting hotter and hotter. I went in there with probably a liter left in the hydration pack, and half a bottle, and a full bottle — where I normally would have thought, yeah, that'll easily last for 10 kilometers. So we knew, okay, up at kilometer 60 is the next waterpoint, 10 kilometers uphill. Nope, it wasn't enough. The air was so still there, it was so hot. I definitely still had about 2 liters of fluid with me, which normally easily lasts for 10 kilometers. And I think at kilometer 57, so about 3 before the waterpoint, I was completely empty and really thirsty. Then we were at the top at kilometer 60. Stopped at the waterpoint, cooled down everything we could. I filled up my hydration pack, filled both 750ml bottles, even though I knew, okay, it's only 16km to the finish and the main climb is definitely done. But we knew, okay, it's so hot, we need this drink now. And after that... came the next waterpoint at kilometer 66, exactly. It took us 19 minutes to get there and I drank two full liters out of the hydration pack in those 19 minutes. That's how hot it was and that's how much fluid you just needed to somehow keep the legs moving and not completely overheat. That worked out pretty well. After that at kilometer 66, there were basically only 10 kilometers left to the finish. A 5-kilometer long trail downhill, which was actually really cool technically. So again lots of turns, but here and there some drops now. It was really fun, it was cool. I made a few mistakes there. But Juri also said that the tires, of course at 39 degrees, no longer had the 1.2 bar we started with in the morning, but were probably at 1.4, and a 2.4-inch tire at 1.4 always has that really nice grip. Anyway, in the loose sand I slipped a few times here and there. And Juri also said he had to properly catch the bike once. That was close to a crash. Anyway, we got the downhill safely done too. And then rode the last five kilometers home over flat trails. That also worked out really well. There you had a few watt spikes, but here and there coming out of a switchback or a corner, putting down another 400 watts. But overall the last three kilometers were only 260 watts, so nothing huge anymore. I was just glad that Juri didn't completely blow up today and that we made it through the stage well and safely, without any bigger technical defects. Overall, for the 76 kilometers we needed four hours and five, at least according to Garmin. I think in the Cape Epic results we're listed at four hours eight. Probably the Garmin auto-pause just cut out the VPs, so those two minutes 14 seconds we spent at the VPs refilling water are missing. Right, overall for the 4 hours I rode 274 NP and 219 average because of the temperature. Normally that would basically, let's say, be a good Fatmax training if we just took the 274 watts. But I had, for example, an average heart rate of 159 and a peak — of course that was when pushing — of 182. So just elevated heart rate because of the heat. And that was really hot and exhausting. I just have to say. Now, after for example, we always take salt tablets at the finish. First ice cubes in the jersey to cool down somehow. Drank an incredible amount already after. Probably, I think I've easily had 4.5 liters already. And it's only 4:30 PM. So you really have to drink a lot for the body to cope with the heat. Right, so that's Day 3 from my perspective. We ended up finishing today on 49th place overall. We came in second in Open Men, so in the amateur class. And moved up to second place in the GC in the amateur class. But you have to say that the third team, which is now in third place, Team Coach Me with Manuel Fasnacht and Stefan Spielmann, had a defect today and apparently cut a tire. So they lost a lot of time today. They're now 23 seconds behind us and fundamentally they ride faster than Juri and me currently. Just from the pairing. So if everything, in quotation marks, goes defect-free over the next four days, they'll probably be back ahead of us later. But I hope we can maybe — let's see, the Cape Epic is still long, we're just at halftime — maybe we can hold third place in the GC. Let's see. The Honeycomb 226ers currently in fourth place are also riding really well. Let's see what happens. But fundamentally it's a lot of fun. On to the UCI Women. That was apparently another pretty clear day for Annika Langvad and Sofia Gomez. They won the whole thing again. The only thing I really caught from the women's race is that unfortunately the partner of Moschetti, the French champion, apparently broke her hand. Really, really bitter. Best German again Stefanie Walter in 12th today. You can see how the time gaps just open up in this heat. They had 45 minutes behind today, which is relatively a lot, but just normal. In this heat, it's just incredibly hard. For example Rosa van der Zanden, the European champion, had 19 minutes behind today. And even Vera Looser, who's African and handles heat well, had four minutes behind today. Right. I watched most of the men's race. That was just incredibly exciting. Really, really cool. Buff Megamo led it today. At least up the first climb, with Wout Alleman and Martin Stosek. After that on the descent, if I saw it correctly, Fabian Rabensteiner had a crash but came home in 7th at the end, so everything seems okay. And then relatively early Marco Gilbert and Tristan Nortje took the initiative and led the whole thing from the front over the trails the whole time. Only Nino Schurter, Filippo Colombo, Luca Braidot and Simone Avondetto stayed with them. And I just don't know if... I mean clearly, Marco Gilbert and Tristan Nortje were on their home trails. They wanted to show, of course, that they know them well. Whether that was really the best tactical solution in the end — riding from the front the whole time — sure, on the trails, the way the trails were today, riding from the front isn't all that bad, because of course you... always have the best line choice. No one — when it goes over stones or something, even if someone stops — you never have the problem of having to dismount. That's of course quite nice. However, especially what I saw in the last meters, they were riding in the wind a lot, when it went over jeep tracks at the end. And in their position, since they really had ambitions for a stage win, I might not have done that. But okay, in the end Luca Braidot and Simone Avondetto won it. That was a really strong sprint. And tactically well played by them, because they held back completely in the last five kilometers. Either Filippo Colombo was riding up front or Tristan Nortje and Marco Gilbert. I would of course have liked the two South Africans to win the stage. But I think they would have had to play it tactically a bit better, because apparently they had the fitness and the power for it. Right, so that's Stage 3. It was definitely a really tough piece of work today. I really hope every amateur and hobby rider gets through it well. I mean, those 10 kilometers uphill from the VP at kilometer 50... and then uphill to the VP at kilometer 60 — they're really hot. I just hope they all fill up their bottles and get through it well. Otherwise, looking ahead to Day 4, I think Day 4 goes into the same climb again, if I see it right. The beginning though is significantly flatter at first. Up to kilometer 40 relatively relaxed, relatively flat, just rolling, let's say. After that, long, long climb again. Supposedly, if I see it right, the same climb or going around the same mountain as today. And after that, the whole thing down again to kilometer 70 and then 10 kilometers flat home. Tomorrow's stage is 80 kilometers with 1950 meters of elevation. It'll be cooler, which is definitely quite nice. However, tomorrow evening it's supposed to start raining. And it's supposed to rain all Friday and also Saturday morning. Those who remember the Cape Epic two years ago, where it rained so crazily in Lourensford — we're going back to Lourensford and it's going to, by the looks of it, rain there again. So Friday is going to be wild and probably Saturday too. For tomorrow for example, we're definitely going to put on fresh brake — well, after tomorrow's stage, fresh brake pads, mount new tires, or rather mount tires for — we're currently running Rick XC front and rear, which is great on this dry, hard ground, but which, when it gets deeper, definitely isn't as good. We're definitely going to switch to Racing — Racing Ralph in the rear and Racing Ray up front. Right, we'll put different brake pads on. And above all, fresh brake pads. And then we hope it won't be too bad. Sure, cooling off is quite cool, but... In a stage race, two days of really, really rain is just really exhausting. And I hope we get through it well. Let's see. Right. So, I continue to keep my fingers crossed for all the other participants, and hopefully I'll check in again tomorrow after a successful stage. Thank you.