Welkom Sandy Plains Ride

Welkom is South Africa’s most deliberately planned city — built from scratch in the 1950s to house the goldfields workforce and designed with wide boulevards, no traffic lights and a distinctive circular layout. The surrounding plains are sandy-soiled Highveld, and the 30km Sandy Plains Ride explores this on farm and access roads around the city’s perimeter.

What to Expect

Sandy soil roads and compacted dirt tracks on entirely flat terrain. The sandy soil makes this deceptively demanding — grip and rolling resistance on loose sandy roads requires more effort than equivalent hard gravel surfaces. The goldfields landscape — mine dumps, flat plains, big sky — surrounds the route throughout.

Sandy Soil Note

Sandy terrain rides completely differently to gravel — lower tyre pressure (1.5–2.0 bar) improves grip significantly. Avoid riding in wet conditions as wet sand on compacted roads becomes extremely difficult.

Getting There

Start in Welkom on the R30 in the central Free State goldfields. GPS: -27.9789, 26.7423.

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