Rwanda cycles to the top

Nathan Byukusenge, Team Rwanda. Coach Boyer says that African cycling is progressing steadily. Within seven years he expects the first black African rider to be in the Tour de France. (Courtesy of Jock Boyer)

( / )

•  
• 1 of 5
• ››

KIGALI, Rwanda — For a rider with dreams of competing in the Tour de France, Rafiki Jean De Dieu Uwimana began in an unusual manner.

For years before joining Rwanda’s national cycling team, he hauled plastic jugs of water atop a creaking, rusted single speed bicycle, earning a small wage from customers in his hillside village.

“I started this when I was 13,” said Uwimana, now a short, wiry 25-year-old who could pass for a teenager were it not for a carefully styled soul patch.

“The business wasn’t bad but I never thought I’d become a professional rider.”

In a region where competitive cycling is still in its infancy, Uwimana’s background is not surprising.

Though North African-born riders have competed for France since the days of its colonial empire, and a white South African, Rudolf Lewis, won the first-ever Olympic gold medal in cycling’s individual time trial, sub-Saharan Africa has produced few elite riders.

Despite the continent’s dominance in distance running — particularly among athletes from Ethiopia, Kenya and the rest of East Africa — no black African has ever competed in cycling’s premiere event, the Tour de France. Until last year, when Rwanda’s Adrien Niyonshuti rode the three-day Tour of Ireland, none had competed in any European pro tour event.

Yet it’s only a matter of time before African cyclists emerge at the sport’s highest levels, according to Team Rwanda coach Jock Boyer.

“You have in Africa people that have the talent to do very well in the Tour de France,” said Boyer, who became the first American to ride the event in 1981 — long before the days of Lance Armstrong when it was an almost exclusively European affair.

“Physiologically, the talent is here. But there are a huge number of things that cyclists must learn over a long period of time to be successful."

In Rwanda, that learning curve began in 2006, when Boyer first visited the country at the request of Tom Ritchey, an American mountain biking guru with designs on developing Rwanda’s cycling talent. Together, the two organized the first Wooden Bike Classic, an annual race named after the two-wheeled, scooter-like contraptions long used for transporting coffee beans by local farmers. Drawing thousands of spectators, the 2006 event featured riders from across Rwanda — from transport cyclists like Uwimana to club riders with some racing experience — mostly on rusted decades-old bikes.

Niyonshuti, already a veteran of Rwanda’s fledgling club circuit, won the inaugural single-speed road race and, months later, was one of five riders selected by Boyer to form the original Team Rwanda.

http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/africa/100820/rwanda-cycling