MTN-Qhubeka’s World Cycling Centre Africa team won the team time-trial at the South African road cycling champs on Friday.
The team, which acts as the development squad to MTN-Qhubeka, took gold ahead of ASG and Europcar.
“This was a major objective for us, we trained quite a bit on the Trek time-trial bike to get the guys used to the set-up,” said team director Jean-Pierre van Zyl.
“Our main goal from the championships was to win the team time-trial and then to target the U23 category in the road race on Sunday.
“The secret to our success is that the whole team has been living together for a while in our base in Potchefstroom. So they are training together and growing as a unit.
“I am very happy, as a lot of work has gone into this result.”
The championships conclude on Sunday with a road race over 160km, where the team will line up against some of South Africa’s best elite cyclists.
“This is a great confident boost for these young riders ahead of the road race on Sunday. They’ve seen today that they are strong, and we can take it to the elite riders.
“We might be the feeder team but we can challenge the more experienced riders,” said Van Zyl.
