Cycling News and Race Results

When Ashleigh Moolman-Pasio (Momentum-Toyota) finished fifth in the Fleche Wallonne Femme (123km) in Belgium on Wednesday 18 April, it might well have been the best result ever by a South African women's cyclist in a World Cup race.

Newly crowned South African Elite women’s road race champion, Ashleigh Moolman Pasio, claimed her first ever victory at the Cape Argus Pick n Pay Cycle Tour on Sunday. But it was a victory marred by the horrific finishing sprint crash that took down and injured all three of her Momentum Toyota teammates.

Ashleigh Moolman Pasio, the South African female road cyclist that’s been on a steep upward curve for the past year, claimed the gold medal in the Elite women’s race at the 2012 South African Road Championships in Nelspruit in the Mpumalanga province on Saturday.

The women started the 100km VW Herald Cycle Tour with both Momentum Toyota and Bizhub FCF dominating right from the start. The big bunch broke into smaller bunches on the first drag 3.9km into the race.

Ashleigh Moolman Pasio’s victory in the women’s race at the Momentum 94.7 Cycle Challenge on Sunday was just reward for Team Nashua Toyota’s investment in South African female road cycling talent over the past year.

Ashleigh Moolman Pasio won a hotly contested 15th Edition of the Momentum 94.7 Cycle Challenge on Sunday. The Nashua Toyota rider was engaged in a 4 way battle that went all the way to the line where she managed to outsprint current champion Cherise Taylor of Team USN.

Cherise Taylor (USN) and Ashleigh Moolman-Pasio (Nashua-Toyota) are set to be the two main protagonists in the Momentum 94.7 Cycle Challenge women’s race on Sunday.

The ladies started the 99km race on their own which meant that team tactics would play a huge role in determining the outcome of the race.

The Nashua Toyota women’s professional cycling team confirmed the benefits of their European racing programme when their riders dominated the Amashova Durban Classic road cycling race in South Africa on Sunday.

The composition of the nine-member national team to compete at the 2011 road cycling World Championships in Copenhagen, Denmark next month shows that the focus placed on Elite women and Under-23 men over the past two years is paying dividends.