RASA & Sombrim; Origin Story

The Race Across South Africa is a definition of a 2150km, 33000m accumulative ascent cross country event taking place annually in South Africa, in winter.

Note: no GPS, take a map and compass, or pay your school fees and go get lost until you can smell your way generally South West…

The term RASA in my opinion applies to a small percentage of mountain bike riders who enter ‘to race’ - they are a unique breed, and I have a conspiracy theory as to their genetic makeup - DNA testing may well show up some Marsupial genes.

For the rest of us pleborians, the 2150km adventure is alternately known as the ‘Freedom Challenge’ - and my description of it is: ‘It’s a ride you’ll hate to love’.

Regarding equipment - ‘lightly’ is key, but very much ‘personal preference’. My wife and I err on the side of ‘heavy’ - preferring heavy waterproof bags and extra layers to try offset the freeze.

For the other side of the thermometer, we have evolved a ‘take the shade with you’ solution - now marketing as Sombrim.

With covid, our first ‘honeymoon’ ride was delayed in 2020 until October - with longer, hotter hours expected in the sun. An idea struck to attach some kind of shade brim to our helmets. We found the effect most beneficial - especially in the Karoo where there was ‘nowhere to hide’.

What is RASA?

Okay, where does Sombrim come in?

Since that ride, the shade brim became my ‘safety blanket’ and I kept revising versions.

In early 2023, I approached a manufacturer in USA to resolve an engineered version. The first Sombrim prototype arrived 5 days before our batch start, and seeing as we had broken so many golden rules about not ‘trying anything new’ on the trail, - adding the prototypes were ‘par for the course’.

I had ridden with versions of the brim since 2020, so didn’t feel any difference, my wife had one test ride with Sombrim prototype attached prior to setting off on our 2150km journey! It is fair therefore that pictures show her with brim on her backpack more often than me - it was both a ‘familiarity’, & a side/front/who knows where from wind issue.

However, when required and ‘popped on’- the Sombrim was well worth taking along in our opinion.

How did the Sombrim hold up?

The weather was generally chilly or wet, with 2 hot days out of the 22 day adventure - and this showed up a major, prior to unrealised advantage of having the Sombrim in place whilst ‘riding wet’. The brim, in constant drizzle conditions, kept rain from seeping through hoodies & down the back of our necks, and off our glasses - this left us chuckling.

In summary - the engineered solution to resolve my amateur version(s) worked perfectly.

I didn’t expect to truly test the ‘pop on / pop off’ solution - but in addition to a ‘wet ride’, the wind misbehaved and came at us seemingly with ‘murderous intent’ - resulting in us both thoroughly testing the ‘poppers’.

The ‘more than expected’ pop on pop off & stow has resulted in us reviewing the Sombrim’s ‘pocket packability’.

Preparation should take place early, and the golden rule of ‘test everything’ should be strictly followed. However, for 2023, we did nothing of the sort.

I was offshore, so ‘training’ was by way of (insufficient) hours on spin bike, whilst my wife was at home where riding solo is now just not worth the risk, - so she also primarily sat on the spin bike. I arrived home 2 weeks prior to our batch start, and we proceeded to break the golden rule into tiny pieces.

In the last 2 weeks leading to start, we had:

Different riding gear ratio setup.

Different riding shirts.

Different bike helmets.

Untested backpacks.

Untested concept of ‘racking the bag’ - to get weight of my wife's back & consequently minimise ‘seat issues’.

Untested winter gloves. (Imported Spatz - turned out to be money wasted)

Untested riding light for my wife. (Proved more reliable than my 3 x the price Gloworm - have since thrown away)

My wife also changed her saddle in this time - very concerning for those aware of what happened during 2020’s ride. Regardless, we pitched for the start, dug in, and proceeded down the trail ‘wondering how things would turn out’.

And they definitely turned out differently.

Somehow, we finished and despite ‘quite a bit’ of anomalies, we achieved what we set out to do - ‘enjoy South Africa’s vastness’ & get home before my daughter's birthday.

Whilst looking to ‘enjoy the freedom’, the clock never stops, and any day is never to be taken lightly- in terms of body & bike maintenance, repeated physicality & constant mental adjustments. (E.g.: We almost came unstuck a few km from finish line - think this was RASA reminding us ‘it’s not over until you’re eating pizza’ - truck traffic mayhem on narrow tar road up final pass, and a complete whiteout of mist on the descent to Diemersfontein.)

Tell me more about the ride...

Some photos from our ride....

Thanks for tagging along for some of our journey.

The end...

These are but a few snapshots of our journey. The Sombrim held up extremely well this year keeping us in the shade during the heat, and keeping us (and our gear) dry in the rain.