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24/08/2018 News

Total Eritrea sponsored Tour Eritrea 2017

More than forty cyclists from six national teams namely Algeria, Eritrea, Kenya, Rwanda, South Africa and Sudan have participated in the event.

Tour Eritrea 2017 “Tour of Friendship and Competence” incorporates climbing long distance mountains, breakaways, attacks and counter attacks. Similar to last year, the tour had five different stages. The first and second classic races held in the Northern Red Sea Region, namely the “NRS Fenkil Challenge” and “Massawa Circuit”. Following the two competitions in the Northern Red Sea Region, the Tour continued form Debarwa to keren covering 124.75 kilometers. The third stage of the race covered 142.13 kilometers from Keren to Barentu and the tour progresses on its fourth stage from Hagaz – Asmara route covering 117.16 km. The following stages conducted were from Mendefera to Massawa covering 169.94 km and from Massawa to Asmara covering 107.79 km. The last stage of the tour was Asmara Circuit covering 125.4 km.

Since the Italian colonial era, cycling is among the most popular sports in Eritrea and it is to be recalled that two cyclists from Eritrea, Daniel Teklehaimanot and Merhawi Kudus, made history in the world's most famous bicycle race:“Tour de France”. The two riders are members of MTN Khubeka now called Dimension Data, the first ever African team in the Tour de France, as well as the first Eritreans to take part in the race.