Cape Epic makes changes to the Elite Women’s Race
Starting this year, the Elite Women’s race at the Absa Cape Epic will feature parity in duration with the Elite Men’s, rather than parity in distance.
The events meticulous research and comprehensive stakeholder engagement suggest that this will produce faster and more competitive racing, while allowing for increased visibility for the athletes and teams taking part in the race broadcast.
The change is designed to foster more strategic and competitive racing in the Elite Women’s category. This, along with a shift in how the broadcast is presented, will provide increased coverage of the Elite Women’s Race. At the core of the change is the desire to bring stage racing in line with the norms of cycling more generally. This will see the Elite Women race for the same duration, rather than across the same distance as the Elite Men. The adjusted distances will encourage earlier attacks, smaller time gaps, and closer competition.
“The change to parity in race time will sharpen the spectacle,” Shannon Valstar, Race Director for the Absa Cape Epic, promised. “This innovation follows naturally from the granting of the UCI HC status to the Elite Women’s race, prize money parity, and the institution of a separate start.“
The 2026 edition will feature dedicated Elite Women’s routes, where the course will deviate from the general Absa Cape Epic route, reducing the total distance to align the expected winning time of the Elite Women with that of the Elite Men. On point-to-point stages, the Elite Women will enjoy a separate remote start. While on stages that loop back to the same start/finish venue, the Elite Women will deviate from the general route to maintain time parity with the Elite Men. The Elite Women will race the general Prologue and Grand Finale routes, due to the fact that the racing duration falls within the time parity outlines set by the event’s management team.
Stages 1, 2, 4, and 6 will see the Elite Women deviating from the general route to finish in the same time as the Elite Men. While on Stage 3 and 5, when the race moves from Montagu to Greyton, and from Greyton to Stellenbosch, the Elite Women will start at Weltevrede Wine Farm, in Bonnievale, and at Beaumont Wines, in Botrivier, respectively.
These changes result in a 560-kilometre total route length, and a course which boasts 13 350 metres of accumulated ascent for an average of 23.83 metres of climbing per kilometre. This is, in fact, more than the 23.19 metres of climbing per kilometre the rest of the 2026 Absa Cape Epic field will take on. More: epic-series.com //