Tristan Nortje and Travis Stedman won in yellow, while Vera Looser and Samantha Sanders won in pink at the summit of the Swartberg Pass, in South African mountain biking’s only mountain top finish. Die Top, as the location at 1 583 metres above sea level is known, is an iconic part of the Momentum Medical Scheme Cape Pioneer, presented by Biogen. As such, winning in the First Ascent leaders’ jerseys is particularly poignant. The momentum Toyota Imbuko Specialized ChemChamp and Efficient Infiniti Insure take from the penultimate stage victories will also serve them well going into the final stage on Saturday.
On Friday, 3 October, Stage 4 featured a daunting route, consisting of 93 kilometres of racing with 2 250 metres of climbing. The imposing Swartberg Pass accounted for nearly 800 metres of that elevation gain, in the final 8.5 kilometres, but getting there was a significant part of the battle too. It was in the build-up that PYGA Euro Steel lost the chance to battle for stage honours, and Efficient Infiniti Insure 2 ceded the opportunity to gain back time on Safari Essence Titan Racing in the battle for the minor UCI Women’s podium places.
The early kilometres had seen a large group of the top women’s teams charging through the track and trails together. Bianca Haw and Danielle du Toit were doing much of the riding when Looser and Sanders were not controlling the pace themselves. The group consisted of those two teams, as well as the third-placed Steph Wohlters and Sarah Hill, the Fortress Real Estate Investments team, Summer Sky Racing, and Absolute Motion. Only in the rocky dual tracks around the 40 kilometre mark did the group break up, leaving the top three teams in contention over the second half of the course.
“We’ve been trying to help our teammates where we can,” Looser stated. “We try to control the pace and limit accelerations to help protect their position on the general classification.” “After Wildehondekloof, when we hit the tar, I lost the wheel,” Wohlters confessed, “Bianca [Haw] had been making it tough through that reserve section, and when we turned onto the tar into the headwind, I couldn’t follow. From there, Sarah [Hill] paced to ensure we didn’t lose too much time, and I think I actually had my best ever ascent of Swartberg Pass.”
When Safari Essence Titan Racing were alone at the sharp end with Looser and Sanders, the women in the pink First Ascent leaders’ jerseys had no reason to be conservative. Instead, they counterattacked to go solo. Once on their own, they rode away to win their fourth stage of the fifteenth edition of the Race with Soul.
“I quite liked the climb,” Looser smiled. “It must be all the time I’ve spent in the Alps in Switzerland and Italy, but I felt really comfortable today. Sam [Sanders] and I are well matched; there’s no need for either of us to push or pull the other. We can just ride to our tempo.” That pace has proved fast enough all week to gain the Efficient Infiniti Insure pair time on every stage.
After four days of racing, going into the final stage, they lead Haw and Du Toit by 35 minutes and 3 seconds. Wohlters and Hill are a further 15 minutes back. The stage results echoed the general classification standings in the UCI Women’s race on the Queen Stage. Behind the Efficient Infiniti Insure team were Safari Essence Titan Racing and Efficient Infiniti Insure 2, with Fortress Real Estate Investments in fourth and Summer Sky Racing in fifth.
In the UCI Men’s race, a similar pattern unfolded. The first 30 kilometres were fast and flat, with no climbs to break up the field, a pack of nearly 30 riders remained together until the first climb an hour into the day. “We tried to keep the pressure on where the terrain suited us,” Wessel Botha explained. This tactic was designed to create the conditions in which riders may make a mistake, but sadly for PYGA Euro Steel, they were the squad to be caught out.
For the second time in the race, Michael Foster suffered a near-catastrophic puncture. The PYGA Euro Steel team were, for the second time in the race, stranded on the side of the trail fixing a puncture for nearly an hour. They would eventually finish 2 hours and 21 seconds behind the stage winners.
After Foster’s puncture, the pace slowed and the group, which allowed the lead group to swell from the Honeycomb 226ers, Toyota Imbuko Specialized ChemChamp, Insect Science, and Summerplace Racing, to include the Imbuko ChemChamp and Absolute Motion teams. The pack of six passed through the final feed zone, at the foot of Swartberg Pass, together before Marc Pritzen accelerated and splintered the group.
“I tried to set a pace I thought I’d be able to sustain from bottom to top,” the South African Marathon Champion stated. “I hoped that it would be enough to put Tristan [Nortje] or Travis [Stedman] in difficulty, but it wasn’t.”
“We followed Marc [Pritzen] to Skelmdraai [with 3 kilometres to climb], then didn’t really attack, just upped our pace a bit,” Nortje recalled. That effort earned Nortje and Stedman a bike length’s advantage before Botha took up the chase, but even the fresher rider was unable to shut the stage-winning move down. Gradually, the overall leaders edged away, but Honeycomb 226ers were always just behind, keeping the leaders pushing to the finish line on the summit.
“To be honest, I considered myself a sprinter on the road, so to win at the top of a mountain like this is very special,” Stedman grinned after crossing the finish line. His and Nortje’s efforts were good enough for a top time on the Swartberg Pass Strava KOM list, too. Stedman’s privacy settings mean his ride does not feature, but Nortje came within 29 seconds of Matthys Beukes’ 29 minutes and 21 seconds record. Pritzen and Botha’s times were 24 and 25 seconds slower, respectively. The trio now hold second to fourth on the Strava leaderboard.
After the penultimate day’s racing, Toyota Imbuko Specialized ChemChamp lead by 4 minutes exactly, from the Honeycomb 226ers. Insect Science is third, after finishing the stage in third, at 27 minutes and 8 seconds. Ignatius du Preez and Herman Fourie, of Summerplace Racing, are fourth. The Absolute Motion combination of Thabiso Zindela and Tayne Rudling finished fifth on the day, but Rudi Koen and Lood Goosen hold that position on the general classification.
Though the men in yellow and the women in pink take momentum into the final stage, it is far from a ceremonial affair. The rocky tracks of Chandelier Game Reserve await as a final test for this year’s race. The route is 66 kilometres long and features a deceiving 1 150 metres of climbing. It will be tougher in reality than it appears on paper, and the unexpected could yet happen.
To see if there will be final-day drama, tune in to the live updates by following @capepioneer on Instagram or liking the Cape Pioneer Facebook page. For more information on the event, please visit www.capepioneer.co.za.
2025 Momentum Medical Scheme Cape Pioneer, presented by Biogen, Results
UCI Men | Stage 4:
- Toyota Imbuko Specialized ChemChamp: Travis Stedman & Tristan Nortje (3:40:40)
- Honeycomb 226ers: Wessel Botha & Marc Pritzen (3:41:04 | +24)
- Insect Science: Arno du Toit & Keagan Bontekoning (3:45:04 | +4:24)
- Summerplace Racing: Ignatius du Preez & Herman Fourie (3:45:39 | +4:59)
- Absolute Motion: Thabiso Zindela & Tayne Rudling (3:46:53 | +6:13)
UCI Women | Stage 4:
- Efficient Infiniti Insure 1: Vera Looser & Samantha Sanders (4:35:43)
- Safari Essence Titan Racing: Bianca Haw & Danielle du Toit (4:41:34 | +5:51)
- Efficient Infiniti Insure 2: Sarah Hill & Steph Wohlters (4:47:36 | +11:53)
- Fortress Real Estate Investments: Ila Stow & Chloe Bishop (4:53:30 | +17:47)
- Summer Sky Racing: Lilian Barber & Karlise Scheepers (4:55:00 | +24:17)
UCI Men’s General Classification after Stage 4:
- Toyota Imbuko Specialized ChemChamp: Travis Stedman & Tristan Nortje (13:59:52)
- Honeycomb 226ers: Wessel Botha & Marc Pritzen (14:03:52| +4:00)
- Insect Science: Arno du Toit & Keagan Bontekoning (14:27:00 | +27:08)
- Summerplace Racing: Ignatius du Preez & Herman Fourie (14:34:32 | +34:40)
- Imbuko ChemChamp: Rudi Koen & Lood Goosen (14:44:00 | +44:08)
UCI Women’s General Classification after Stage 4:
- Efficient Infiniti Insure 1: Vera Looser & Samantha Sanders (17:35:25)
- Safari Essence Titan Racing: Bianca Haw & Danielle du Toit (18:10:28 | +35:03)
- Efficient Infiniti Insure 2: Sarah Hill & Steph Wohlters (18:25:45 | +50:20)
- Fortress Real Estate Investments: Ila Stow & Chloe Bishop (19:03:22 | +1:27:57)
- Summer Sky Racing: Lilian Baber & Karlise Scheepers (19:26:06 | +01:50:31)
To view the full results from the 2025 Momentum Medical Scheme Cape Pioneer, presented by Biogen, click here.
