Well the 2011 Cape Argus Cycle tour is only five days away and whether you're participating or not, whether you never learned to ride or you're involved in an unholy union with your bike, it is going to affect your life. There will be massive road closures for most of the day and as you may have noticed early morning driving will become a nightmare over the next few days as the roads are taken over by packs of men with shaved legs and woman with thighs that could kick start Boeings. Oddly despite all this inconvenience you'll never find a Cape Town resident that complains about the inconvenience and is genuinely upset. For the most part Cape Town residents get behind the Cape Argus like a car guard behind a car that hasn't paid. If you find an angry Cape Townian you can be sure they are tourists or have only recently moved to Cape Town from Johannesburg.
The Argus cycle Tour has been in existence for over thirty years which explains Cape Town's love affair with the event. You can speak to almost everyone in Cape Town and they will know someone who has done the Argus if they haven't done it themselves. The history records of the tour are littered with those that spent years watching it and thought, "I could do that, you're sitting down most of the time anyway." I was one of them all I will say is that it was the most horrific experience of my life.
Don't get me wrong, the Argus cycle tour is a lovely event, a fun filled day of camaraderie, mishaps and memories. If you train! I didn't, in fact half an hour into the race I had far out done any previous training I might have attempted. Torture would've been preferable. I don't doubt that throughout the day there were some instances that should have formed happy memories, I just can't remember them, they've been blanked out by the feeling of pain and humiliation that will forever be seared into my brain when my legs cramped up so badly that I couldn't pedal or even remove my legs from the pedals. I just rolled to a painful stop and fell over. A traffic official had stopped behind me and when they had finished wiping the tears of laughter from their eyes they helped me back up.
The most affected roads will be through Noordhoek and Hout Bay, chapmans Peak Drive M6 and Noordhoek Rd to Princess Rd, will be closed from Saturday 6pm till Sunday 4:30pm. The area around the Green Point Stadium will be affected for most of the weekend. Western Boulevard, Beach Road to New Traffic Circle (city bound carriageway and Sea Point bound carriageway) will be closed from midday Saturday till 6:30pm Sunday. The best route in and out of town from the Southern Suburbs will be the main road, as Heerengracht Rd and Hertzog Blvd will be closed as will the N2 out of town. The M3 southbound will be closed for most of the morning the last stretch will reopen at around midday. This will be the road that will affect the Southern Suburbs the most.
From the bottom of Suikerbosie the coastal road that stretches right through Bantry Bay, Camps Bay and Clifton will be closed from just after 6:00 am on Sunday when the race leaders start coming through, till just after 5:00pm when the back markers start limping through.