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CYCLISTS OUT OF COMMONWEALTH GAMES

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MBABANE – Their best was not enough.

This is after Eswatini duo of Kwanele Jele and Muzi Shabangu crashed out of the gruelling 160 kilometres over 10 laps of a 16km course in Warwick, Australia.  They could not finish due to the 10-minute rule. It states that once you are trailing 10 minutes from the one leading the race, you are forced to pull out of the race. They were pulled out after 48km. Muzi had done 01:12:48 (11:07 minutes behind the leading peleton, while Kwanele had 01:13:21 (11:42) minutes behind the leading peleton).

It was not going to be an easy race as they were racing among the best 124 cyclists in the world. Only 73 finished the race. The winner was Australia’s Aaron Gate with a time of 03:28:29 hours and he was followed by South Africa’s Daryl Impey on 03:28:29 hours. They were separated by split seconds. Reached for comment Eswatini Cycling Association President, Sifiso ‘Zwide’ Ndwandwe said: “It’s was an intense race and it was exciting to watch with many lessons to pick out and build on for the future. We’ll await the technical report and make decisions from there, but we already know we need to identify more International Cycling Union- accredited races to send our cyclists to so they can accumulate more points and improve their seeding so they at least start further up the field,” said Ndwandwe.

He also said the races would also give them a lot more experience with riding in that high-intensity space. “This is definitely not the end of the road for our two boys as they have shown over the last six months that they have the commitment to make time to put themselves in the high pressure environments and learn and improve from there, so they definitely form the core of our plans moving forward and we’ll continue to push and support them. We believe they have a great potential to do us proud on the international stage,” he said. He also appreciated Coach Artwell Ndzinisa for the work he has done since coming on board.

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