Alex Miller – Ace MTB cyclist

GROWING up on a farm near Helmeringhausen in the arid expanse of southern Namibia, Alex Miller (20) has been cycling for as long as he can remember.

“I had a BMX bike, so I always rode around on the farm. In 2014, when I was 13, I entered a half-marathon race at Klein Aus Vista and enjoyed it so much that I went back the next year and finished third in the junior category,” he says.

In 2016 he was back, doing the full marathon for the first time, and announcing his arrival on the Namibian MTB scene when he won the junior category and finished fifth overall among the seniors.

“I realised this is what I want to do, and it’s also where I met my coach, Hans du Toit, who put me on a training programme. That’s how it all started,” Miller says.

He made swift progress, and by 2017 the results started to show.

Miller was selected for the Namibian junior team for the Africa MTB Championships in Mauritius, where he won a bronze medal, while he made a big impact at The Namibian Cycle Classic, beating Xavier Papo by more than 10 minutes to win the elite men’s category, despite being only 16 years old.

In 2018 he reaped the rewards of his hard work under Du Toit when he won the gold medal at the Africa Junior MTB Championships in Cairo, Egypt.

“It was a great feeling to win the African gold medal. It had been one of my goals for quite a while, and shortly after winning it I headed to Europe to compete at the World MTB Championships in Lenzerheide, Switzerland,” he says.

Here, Miller only managed to come 26th in the junior category, but he made a good-enough impression to be invited to a training camp at the Union Cycliste Internationale Centre in Switzerland the following year.

Back in Namibia, he started 2019 in great style when he beat Dan Craven by a split second to win the national road race championships on 3 February, and three weeks later won the senior men’s title at the National MTB Marathon Championships, beating national champion Tristan de Lange for the first time.

His finest performance, however, came on 13 April 2019 when he competed in the senior men’s category at the African MTB Championships in Windhoek.

Despite being only 18 years old at the time, he produced a brilliant ride to win the bronze medal behind two South Africans, but more importantly, by finishing as the second country behind SA, Miller had also secured a spot for Namibia at the Tokyo Olympic Games.

The Namibian Cycling Federation decided to select four races to determine who would go to the Olympics, and a fascinating battle between Miller and De Lange ensued over the next year as they battled it out for the Olympics ticket.

Miller took an early lead after the 2019 National MTB Championships counted as the first selection race, while he also edged De Lange when he came third at the second selection race – the first leg of the SA MTB Cup series at Mbombela, Mpumalanga, on 15 February 2020, when De Lange had to withdraw due to a mechanical problem.

On 5 July De Lange, however, bounced back when he beat Miller by more than a minute at the Nedbank cross-country series in Windhoek, but a week later Miller gave a great performance at the final selection race to beat De Lange by more than three minutes at the National MTB Championships.

On 7 August 2020 the NCF finally announced Miller had been selected to represent Namibia at the Tokyo Olympics.

Miller was thrilled.

“I’m very excited, to say the least. It’s been my dream since I first started riding seriously in 2016, but I didn’t think I’d reach it so soon, so the whole experience has been very rewarding.

“I’m definitely aiming for a top-20 place at least, and hopefully a bit higher. It’s difficult to gauge myself against international riders now because of a lack of international races, but that’s my aim,” he says.

Miller will represent Namibia at the Tokyo Olympic Games in the men’s mountain bike cross-country race at the Izu Mountain Bike Course in Tokyo on Monday, 26 July.

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