{"id":18804,"date":"2013-03-19T15:18:43","date_gmt":"2013-03-19T13:18:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/hermida-van-houts-win-sandy-first-cape-epic-stage\/"},"modified":"2013-03-19T15:18:43","modified_gmt":"2013-03-19T13:18:43","slug":"hermida-van-houts-win-sandy-first-cape-epic-stage","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/hermida-van-houts-win-sandy-first-cape-epic-stage\/","title":{"rendered":"Hermida, Van Houts win sandy first Cape Epic stage"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t \"Jose<\/a><\/p>\n

Jose Hermida and Rudi van Houts of Multivan Merida celebrate after winning the first stage of the 2013 Absa Cape Epic mountain bike race from Citrusdal, South Africa, on March 18. Photo: Shaun Roy\/Cape Epic\/Sportzpics<\/p>\n

The Multivan Merida team of Jos\u00e9 Hermida and Rudi van Houts won the first stage of the 2013 Absa Cape Epic on Monday in a time of 4:30.56,7 to take the overall lead in 5:27.13,8.<\/p>\n

After 96km and 2 350m of climbing, they were closely followed by former champion Karl Platt and Urs Huber of team Bulls in 4:32.17,6.<\/p>\n

Thomas Dietsch and Tim Boehme of team Bulls 2 crossed the line 1,3 seconds later to claim third in 4:32.18,9.<\/p>\n

Prologue winners Christoph Sauser and Jaroslav Kulhavy of team Burry Stander-Songo came home in fourth in 4:33.46,0, leaving them second overall in 5:28.56,1.<\/p>\n

Platt and Huber moves into third overall in 5:29.36,3 with Dietsch and Boehme fourth in 5:30.10,8.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think we\u2019re now in the lead, which is great,\u201d said Van Houts. \u201cIt\u2019s always hard to get a stage win in the Cape Epic.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m really happy. Now we just need to focus on the overall and try and stay in front every day.<\/p>\n

\u201cToday\u2019s stage was very sandy with loose rocks and we did a lot of running. Luckily we\u2019re both light riders and could stay in the saddle in some sections.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was quite a technical ride,\u201d said Hermida. \u201cI have no energy left, not even to talk.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOn the first downhill I hit a big rock and broke my rim,\u201d said Sauser. \u201cWe had to wait for another wheel. After that we did a lot of chasing.<\/p>\n

\u201cTomorrow\u2019s going to be hard and hopefully a bit faster. The sand slowed us down today.\u201d<\/p>\n

Esther S\u00fcss and Jane Nuessli of BMC Wheeler won the women\u2019s category in 5:29.00,5 for a combined time of 6:37.22,1.<\/p>\n

They are ahead of the African\/British duo of Yolande Speedy and Catherine Williamson (Energas) who placed second in 5:58.12,7 for an overall time of 7:10.09,1.<\/p>\n

Third were South Africans Hanlie Booyens and Ischen Stopforth (Pragma Volcan). They clocked 6:03.44,7 for an overall time of 7:19.07,6).<\/p>\n

The RE:CM team of Erik and Ariane Kleinhans won the mixed category in 5:17.44,3 for an overall time of 6:24.08,2).<\/p>\n

They were followed by Peta Mullens and Jarrod Moroni (Target TREK-Moronis Bikes) in 5:38.24,0 (overall 6:49.46,1).<\/p>\n

Third went to Johan Labuschagne and Yolandi de Villiers in 5:42.18,4 (overall 6:54.56,0).<\/p>\n

Darren Lill and Charles Keey (Cannondale Blend) lead the race for the Absa African jersey.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Jose Hermida and Rudi van Houts of Multivan Merida celebrate after winning the first stage of the 2013 Absa Cape Epic mountain bike race from Citrusdal, South Africa, on March 18. Photo: Shaun Roy\/Cape Epic\/Sportzpics The Multivan Merida team of Jos\u00e9 Hermida and Rudi van Houts won the first stage of the 2013 Absa Cape […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[3258,830,885],"class_list":{"0":"post-18804","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-mysport","8":"tag-news","9":"tag-sport","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18804","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18804"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18804\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18804"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18804"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18804"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}