PIETERMARITZBURG, 26 FEBRUARY 2016 – Another successful performance from Jeep Team’s OCR champion, Thomas van Tonder, saw him claim victory in 1h45m at Race#3 of The Beast OCR Challenge, which took place on Saturday, 20 February, at The Wedge in Johannesburg.
This latest win means Van Tonder is also the overall Beast Challenge series winner, having claimed all three Beast titles.
Marius Smith finished Race#3 in 2nd in 1h50m, with Jeep Team’s Jay Jay Deysel finishing 3rd in 1h57m.
Van Tonder and Deysel both competed in The Savage Beast, the Elite-category 15-km challenge that encompassed 57 obstacles, each testing athletes’ physical and mental endurance.
This is the second major OCR win for Van Tonder in 2016. Earlier this month, he won the Men’s Black Ops Elite event at Race#1 of the Jeep Warrior Series.
Said Van Tonder, “The course was about 15 km long and was packed with 57 obstacles, of all sorts and sizes. This was almost double the amount of obstacles that I am used too. But this worked to my advantage since I tend to make up time on the obstacles. The obstacle I enjoyed most was hands-down the big swing on to the cargo net with water coming from the top of the net. Seriously fun!
Most of South Africa’s Elite OCR athletes were on the start line, so I knew anything could happen in the race. I managed to create a gap between myself and the rest of the field 2 to 3 km into the race. As the race went on I got up to about a 4-minute lead, which I held onto until the finish line.
It was a hard but awesome race, with some new epic obstacles thrown in that took all the Elite athletes by surprise. What an amazing start to 2016, winning these two back-to-back OCR events. I feel blessed. Bring on Jeep Warrior#2!”
The Beast #3 OCR Challenge Results
Men:
- Thomas van Tonder – 1h45
- Marius Smith – 1h50
- Jay Jay Deysel – 1h57
- Bradley Claase – 2h19
- Louis Smit – 2h26
Women:
- Michelle Meyer – 3h18
Other Jeep Team results:
Multisport
In the Western Cape, Jeep Team’s Mikaela Jonsson and Michael Lord competed in the first major event on the 2016 multisport calendar – the Fedhealth Xterra Grabouw multisport event.
Fedhealth Xterra Grabouw is the biggest Xterra event in the world, with over 2000 athletes battling it out for the coveted title of South African Xterra champion. There are also numerous age group qualification slots up for grabs for the Xterra World Championship held annually in October in Hawaii.
Jonsson (19), racing in the Xterra Lite event (400m swim, 12.5km MTB, 5km trail run), managed an impressive 3rd place finish overall in 1h26. Hayley Preen won the Women’s event in 1h23, with Vicky Van Der Merwe 2nd in 1h25.
In the Xterra Full event (1.5km swim, 28km MTB, 12.5km trail run), Jeep Team’s Michael Lord finished in an impressive 4th place overall in 2h35:44.
Bradley Weiss claimed the title in 2h30, with James Cunnama 2nd in 2h32m and Aiden Dunster 3rd in 2h35:01.
Paddling
In KwaZulu-Natal, Jeep Team’s multiple world champion paddler, Hank McGregor, teamed up with Jasper Mocké to take on the epic three-day Dusi Canoe Marathon, which took place from 18 – 20 February.
After three days of racing against a star-studded field of South Africa’s top paddlers, McGregor and Mocké finished second overall behind first-placed Andy Birkett / Lance Kime with Sbonelo Khwela / Banetse Nkhoesa in 3rd.
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