1601 DT final

the actual race. Talking of the “Round the Houses” race,
this was originally the actual time trial used to determine
the starting order for the first race day. When cars still
took part as well it was an even more spectacular event,
with some of South Africa’s top racing drivers of the time
like Paddy Driver and Eddie Keizan storming around the
streets in 800hp V8 trucks! The “Round the Houses”
is a traditional part of the Roof, and there is now talk
of timing the event again, and making it part of the
Thursday time trial.
Paul Van Aswegen gets boosted
by the cheerleaders...
Time Trial:
The rumours of the time trial being very tough and
designed to thin out the field on the first day proved
to be unfounded when most competitors completed it
considerably faster than expected. In fact most riders
arrived at the finish line smiling and looking pretty fresh,
despite the very hot and dry weather. It seemed that
the most difficult part of the route was choking dust
rather than the track. Wade Young (KTM) arrived first
as expected, although he faced a strong challenge
from local rider Charan Moore (KTM), Brett Swanepoel
(Yamaha) Graham Jarvis (Husqvarna) and to every one’s
surprise, the out of retirement Jade Gutzeit, also on a
Yamaha. He had not raced off road at all for almost three
years, and although having a reputation as a fearsome
rider, this layoff, kept him off the pundits’ radar.
Whilst the riders disappeared early on Thursday night,
and the service crews worked late preparing the bikes
for an early start in the morning, the experts ( 2500 of us
scattered all over that side of Lesotho), sagely discussed
the results of the time trial and confidently predicted
the leaders for the next day, and the entire race. Some
of the predictions were spot on… most of the experts
said Young, Swanepoel, Teasdale, Gillet and Gilbert
and few others would be up front. The end of Friday’s
racing section, where they predicted Gutzeit and Jarvis
weren’t up the pace set by the young guns, proved to
be completely wrong.
22 DIRT & TRAIL MAGAZINE JANUARY 2016
1601 DT Roof 2015.indd 22 2015/12/16 9:37 AM