A small group of Specialized-Mountainbiker.ats mobilised in the town of Purbach to compete in the Leithaberg Radmarathon. This annual event sees a large field embark on a 40km circuit over the dreaded Leithaberg Mountains. The course leads south from the start in Purbach to Dornbach, where we climb to the far side of the Leithaberg hills. Once on the other side, it rolls along the flats back north before turning once again over the range back towards Neusiedler See. From there it is a few flat and windy kilometers back to Purbach. Aside from the beautiful scenery, this radmarathon is interesting because riders can choose how many laps they do- 2, 3 or 4- during the event!
For anybody trying to be a bit competitive, you can imagine how confusing tactics become...
KTM-Junkers, one of Austria's top professional teams, was also present, with local boy Michi Knopf the celebrity guest. For the Specialized-Mountainbiker.at riders in the front, it seemed that the KTMs were just playing cat and mouse, but as we were going for the 120km program, and they the 160km, a toe-to-toe confrontation was happily avoided.
Aside from the KTM boys, we rode strongly at the front and held a firm grip on the front group. 20km from the end, Alex Tuma took off, not to be seen again, winning with a minute and a half over Christian Pavitschitz from KTM-Junkers. Georg Bohunovsky and I did some attacking closer to the finish and we took 3rd and 5th places. This also gave Specialized-Mountainbiker.at the team win. Not bad!
It was a great feeling to go home to our mothers and make them proud!
When the dust had settled:
80km
Harald Füby was 19th and Florian Wammel 56th in the 80Km event. Petra Ganster finished 10th in the women´s category.
120km
Alex Tuma numero uno, yours truly 3rd, Georg Bohunovsky 5th. Team prize? Ours!
