When the race was advertised as the hardest race it the world I just grinned. Today I felt the pain and reality set in as we climbed the 1200m up Hatchers pass. The stage was 50km but it was going to turn out as the hardest 50km of this race. We worked together for the first 30km just keeping a decent tempo and getting ready to dig deep. With around 15km to go Krige raised the tempo as he was now in 3rd and in contention to come in second if he could gain 10 minutes on Chris. I paced with him as we pulled away from the others. With around 8km to go we went around a 180 degree turn and then we saw the wall we had to climb. It was clear that this was going to be every man for himself as we started on the 13% climb. I slowly pulled away from Krige and just kept a tempo that was good for me. It was steep and my muscles were screaming for a break but I knew it was just the last couple minutes to go and it would all be over. Stopping was out of the question. I completed the stage in 2 hours and 11 minutes. Krige came in around 3 minutes behind me but he only made up around 7 minutes on Chris leaving him in third spot. My total time for the race was around 12 hours and 20 minutes. The conditions was tough and the racing was hard but I came here with one clear goal, to get into top racing form for the UCI world champs which will take place in six weeks from now. I feel that that goal has been achieved. Time will tell.