After winning his maiden Leppin Ironman in 1988, Rockley Montgomery had attracted new sponsors and extra media attention. In this installment, Rockley describes his second stab at Ironman glory.
getting rather good. I was training with the National Panasonic Cycling team, as I was also
sponsored by National Panasonic. Training with the country's top cyclists and doing a number
of three and four day cycle tours soon got me fit enough on the bike to win the Transvaal 40km
Time Trial Champs and set me up to really dominate the triathlon cycle legs.
"The second point was the infamous short cut controversy. The race rules had been changed to
prevent paddlers just entering the race to assist someone else, so after the front bunch settled
down, it was Henk, Ronnie Pronk, Frank Sol and myself in front. This meant that Henk had to drop all three of us to get away from me. To his credit he did break away just before the end of the paddle to make about a minute on me and the rest. But, with my cycling at the level it was, I hauled him back in a few klicks and never saw him again.
"As we approached the far end of the Hartebeesport Dam, the lead car took a left turn onto a road I knew well. I also knew that this was not the route to follow. I stoped at the point where the
lead car had turned off and signalled them to come back. They saw me and stopped, but
signalled me to come to them. I turned and blasted down a short way and we had a heated
discussion. I told them they had taken the wrong route. They disagreed and said I was to
follow them. I did this but still complaining. After about 2 km’s they got word from the
organisers that I was in fact correct and they asked me to turn around and follow them back.
"Knowing the area very well and considering the time lost, I decided that possession was nine
tenths of the law. That is if I turned around and ended up not only having wasting precious
time stopping then stopping again and then riding along slowly having a fat argument as well
as doing about 4 km’s further than everyone else, all I deeded was a possible puncture and
then not win the race, to have a very poor appeal at the end of the day. However, if I won the
race, I would hold all the big cards, so I kept on and joined the course on the other side of the
dam, cutting off a few km’s (not any where near the 7km’s later claimed). They slapped me
with a 30 minute time penalty (the equivalent of about 18 km’s).
"Even after that time was deducted, I still won and Henk to his credit, he was a very good sportsman, admitted that the race was well over before the misleading turn. My only regret with regard to that race was that after the incident which took place in the first third of the cycle leg, I lost my motivation to drive myself to the very limit. I had planned to really have a full go at that Iron Man and give myself an idea of just how good I really was at that point."
