The Cape Epic, under current sponsorship as the "Absa Cape Epic", is a two person team annual mountain bike stage race held in the Western Cape, South Africa. It has been accredited as a XCO event by the Union Cycliste Internationale. Teams have to race together for the entire distance of the race, looking after each other and their equipment. First staged in 2004, the race typically covers more than 700 kilometres (435 mi), and lasts eight days. The Absa Cape Epic attracts top riders from around the world, who compete in teams of two. The race is also open to amateurs, who enter a lottery in order to gain a slot. The race is broken into day-long segments, called stages. Times to finish each stage are aggregated to determine the overall winning team at the end of the race. The team with the lowest aggregate time at the end of each day wears the yellow leaders’ jerseys. The course changes every year, but the race has always finished in the winelands of the Western Cape. Since 2007, the climax of the final stage has been at the Lourensford Wine Estate. The Absa Cape Epic was once described by Bart Brentjens, 1996 Olympic gold medallist in mountain biking, as the "Tour de France of mountain biking”.
Read more about Cape Epic: Origins, Route, Race Concept, Prologue, Mass and Staggered Start, Time Trial, Floating Trophy Awarded To Overall Winners, Exxaro Academy
Famous quotes containing the words cape and/or epic:
“A solitary traveler whom we saw perambulating in the distance loomed like a giant. He appeared to walk slouchingly, as if held up from above by straps under his shoulders, as much as supported by the plain below. Men and boys would have appeared alike at a little distance, there being no object by which to measure them. Indeed, to an inlander, the Cape landscape is a constant mirage.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“In an age robbed of religious symbols, going to the shops replaces going to the church.... We have a free choice, but at a price. We can win experience, but never achieve innocence. Marx knew that the epic activities of the modern world involve not lance and sword but dry goods.”
—Stephen Bayley (b. 1951)