Nino Shurter and Matthias Stirnemann from Scott SRAM MTB Racing won this year's Absa Cape Epic! My favorite Karl Platt finished twelfth. The first team of Scott proved to be the best after more than 600 kilometers "wilderness" during which they had to overcome more than 15,000 meters of ascent. One of the most important "wheel" in the total victory of Scott team certainly was their reserve team which is on the last stages proved his worth. Little by little, they were breaking other teams and won with 17 seconds ahead of team Trek Selle San Marco 2 with Damiano Ferrara and Fabian Rabensteiner. Shurter and Stirnemann are finished todays stage as the third. They probably didn't bother because their most dangerous competitors for overall victory, team Investec Songo Specialized sank on one of the last long climb.
The difference between Scott SRAM MTB Racing and Investec Songo Specialized teams at the end of the overall amount of more than 8 minutes. At the end of the race we got the impression that, with everything else, the great role played something worse edition of returnees among professionals and one of the greatest legends of this race, Christoph Sauser. Third place overall in the end, for only 1 minute, today managed to win Nicola Rohrbac and Daniel Geismayr of Centurion Vaude two teams.
Perhaps the biggest drama took place today in the race veterans. In fact, before the last leg of Tomi Misser and Ibon Zugasti got Orbea Factory had more than 3 minutes ahead of team BMC Racing Absa which are performed Cadel Evans and George Hincapie. You guessed it, Evans and Hincapie are today's victory and the benefits of more than 5 minutes managed to reverse the order and thus their homes to take the trophy for the best veteran team of this year's race!
Greetings to the 15th edition of the Absa Cape Epic race in 2018!
Photo: Absa Cape Epic