It is dawn on a Thursday, the sun is barely over the horizon. A mist swirls between the 25 canoes packed on the banks of the Msunduzi River at the Natal Canoe Club in Pietermaritzburg. Jane Swarbreck and former Olympian Jen Theron are already sweating. They are paddlers in Group C, among the top women in African river racing.
The Dusi Canoe Marathon is a journey across 119 kilometers of wild and treacherous waters in the searing heat of KwaZulu-Natal, tackled only by the toughest competitors. This race draws tens of thousands, only a thousand qualify, and fewer make it to the finish line. Even fewer are women.
This is how Africa’s toughest river race has run since 1951. It was conceived by South African soldier Ian Player around a campfire in Italy, during World War II.  Six years after the war, Player was the only one to finish it. It took him six days, eight hours and 15 minutes. He survived two days of low rivers, a flash flood and a night adder bite.
For Swarbreck and Theron, who finished fifth in the women’s category, the challenges on the white waters would make Player tremble in his soaked boots.
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“There is a massive difference between navigating with an 18kg and a 22kg canoe. It is slower in a heavier one, but your lines in the water with a lighter canoe have to be clean. If not, you will sink and that can cost you four to five minutes a time. When you are racing, every minute counts,” says Theron.
It is a race won on the road as much as the river. The weight makes a huge difference when portaging – that is getting out of the water and carrying the canoe rather than risking it split in half on the rocks.
“The Dusi is unlike any race in South Africa. If you cannot run you do not stand a chance of winning… sometimes I just wish a man could race in a woman’s body to see how difficult it is,” she says.
Theron knows a thing or two about the limits of the female body. She competed in the 500 meter K2 and K1 sprints at the 2008 Beijing Olympics, finishing 8th and 7th respectively. For years, she trained alongside men and says there is a big difference in physicality between genders.
“Men have a faster recovery time because of their testosterone. It does not mean women train less than men, they train equally, it is just they are physically unable to,” says Theron.
Along with carrying heavy canoes, barring the first day when they set out in a women-only group, women racers face off canoe-to-canoe with men.
“On the water you have guys constantly tailing you in your wake, like the peloton in the Tour de France, it can take off 30% of their resistance in the water and you cannot get them off your back,” says Swarbreck.
An electrical engineer by day, Swarbreck is a South African adventure racer, who has at times ‘dabbled’ on the water. A year ago you would not have caught her near the Dusi race. She learned to paddle in a few months and was surprised when Theron approached her to team up.
“Even getting around the dam once and not falling in the water was an accomplishment for me. Now, I came fifth in the Dusi. Who knows what can happen next year,” says Swarbreck.
Despite having equal footing on the water, women that win prize money have a different story to tell.
“I think it is really unfair that the race organizers can give male winners R115,000 ($10,500) and the females half of that. It is the only race in South Africa where the top prizes are unequal,” says Theron.
The organizing committee cited that the prize pool was smaller due to a lack of depth of field in the women’s category. In the 2013 Fish River Canoe Marathon, also held in South Africa, the prize money sat at R30,000 ($2,750) for both genders.
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“What is more upsetting was the female winners were 23rd overall. A couple of years ago, coming in 64th would have meant you came first. You can see how women have improved and their race was much more exciting than the men’s,” says Theron.
Abbey Ulansky, known as the Dusi Queen, clinched her ninth pole position when she crossed the line with partner Robyn Kime, called the Dusi Princess, making it their third victory in a row as a pair.  They won with a slim lead of two minutes and eight seconds.
Along with Theron and Swarbreck was an unlikely pair made up of a Czech, Ana Adamova, who trained in the sub-zero temperatures of a European winter, and South African Abby Adie. From day one, they were nipping at the leaders’ heels.
It was an eventful final day for Adamova and Adie. The two started 90 seconds behind the leaders. What they did not see coming were children pelting them with stones 20 kilometers from the end. Adamova finished the race with blood pouring down her face.
Of the 817 canoes that took to the misty waters of the Msunduzi River in Pietermaritzburg, 715 made it to Durban three days later. It is a tough race for anyone, for these women it is just another day on the water.

‘I Wish A Man Could Race In A  Woman’s Body’

It’s half past five on a Thursday morning, the sun barely over the horizon. A mist swirls between the 25 canoes packed onto the banks of the Msunduzi River at the Natal Canoe Club in Pietermaritzburg. The paddlers in Group A, the best in African river racing, are already sweating. It’s very humid early. Some stretch, others check their canoes for the last time. They stare straight ahead, focus as sharp as a needle; they head off.
This race draws tens of thousands. Only 1,000 qualify, fewer make it to the finish line. This is how Africa’s toughest river race has run since 1951. It’s a journey across 119 kilometers of wild and treacherous waters in the searing heat of the KwaZulu-Natal (KZN) province.
The Dusi Marathon was born around a campfire in Italy, during World War II. South African soldier Ian Player looked into the flames and came up with the idea of a downriver race. At the time, Player was in the 6th South African Armoured Division attached to the American 5th Army. It took six years after the war was finished for Player to organize the Dusi and he was the only one to finish it. It took him six days, eight hours and 15 minutes. He survived two days of low rivers, a flash flood and a night adder bite.
These days it takes paddlers less time. Each year it changes between singles and pair races. Among the thousands, Andrew Birkett and partner Sbonelo Zondi were the first to finish this year’s race in seven hours and 43 minutes, 10 minutes off the fastest time ever.
“The whole journey has been amazing! I’m super chuffed, especially with our discipline over this last year, and it’s a really special feeling to have won. It almost feels like this is the first Dusi I’ve ever won because of the whole change in start procedure here on day three and the finish is a really amazing experience,” says Birkett shortly after standing in triumph as his canoe crossed the finish line.
Birkett has now won it four times. For Zondi, the win meant more. He crashed out in the singles race last year  after leading into the final day.
This year, records were broken in the women’s category. Abbey Ulansky, known as the Dusi Queen, clinched her ninth pole position when she crossed the line with partner Robyn Kime, called the Dusi Princess, making it their third victory in a row.
“I’ve just finished my masters two weeks ago which has made the build up to this year’s race quite challenging. Now that the Dusi is done, and my studies are done, I’m free and my boyfriend and I are going traveling,” says Kime.
When most people would take a break at a hotel in Mauritius, Kime’s idea of a holiday is traveling on a yacht from Cape Town to Rio de Janeiro and then going mountain climbing in Bolivia and Peru. Ulansky announced she is retiring from competitive racing now that she has a family to look after.
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Day 1
A gunshot cracks in the distance. The 25 canoers in Group A flail with their paddles at a mad dash from Camps Drift. Around the corner is the Ernie Pearce Weir, a narrow meter-high drop into a wetland piled with river rocks and rimmed with spectators.
The fastest have more room, the rest pack like sardines down the narrow fall. To the cheers of families and boys screaming school war cries, the canoes scrape each other in the muddy water. Paddlers swear as they are thrown into reeds, rocks and cameramen. Those who escape swiftly, gain a few seconds.
The sun rises and the heat is even more oppressive. Seconders, or team helpers, mostly friends and family, run down the riverside with buckets of iced water and sponges for the racers. Water squeezed from the sponges turns to steam in the blink of an eye.
At the end of the day’s race, Nkosi Mzolo, a member of the Soweto Canoe &amp; Recreation Club (SCARC), in Johannesburg, recovers in the shade. SCARC are more used to paddling through sewage and fighting off angry fishermen at their home turf, the Power Park Dam. It’s a world away from the clean air of KZN.
Where most competitors will travel back to Pietermaritzburg to rest and then leave at 4AM for Day 2, Mzolo will go home to see his mother where he grew up, five kilometers from the end point.
“The hardest thing about the Dusi is running eight kilometers with a 22 kilogram canoe on your back. You have to train running with the boat,” says Mzolo.
The man, who spends every moment he can on the water, spends the rest of his time saving lives.  He’s been a paramedic for four years, and is studying to be a doctor.
On one Dusi race, Mzolo needed a medic of his own. Mzolo hit the Ernie Pearce Weir along with six other canoes. Mzolo went under. The other canoes went over him. When he surfaced he knew two ribs were cracked and he was forced to forfeit the race. This time around he finished the day in 12th, a long way off Birkett and Zondi.
“I’ll never miss a Dusi, its fun but it’s really hard,” says Mzolo.
SCARC helps children in Soweto get into canoes. The effort has paid off; among them are eight of the most promising canoeists competing in this year’s Dusi, he says.
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Day 2
The race pushes through the Valley of a Thousand Hills, a mountainous countryside littered with rondavels (Southern African-styled huts) and roaming cows. On dirt roads that rarely see rubber, convoys of 4x4s stretch from one side of the valley to the other. People washing clothes in the river get caught up in the action and cheer as the paddlers fly past.
“One of our biggest worries was making it to Inanda Dam in one piece. There are some treacherous rapids like the Washing Machine where you have to slide over a rock which is a hazard. Many guys have lost their lead in waters leading up to the dam,” says competitor Calvin Hellens.
“Every second counts in the Dusi. Most people have to start the race with a new canoe. It lowers the risk of it cracking. By the end, it looks like an old one,” says Hellens’ crew member Kate Swarbreck. The two compete in the mixed category in a canoe that cost them R6,000 ($550).
You can pay up to R20,000 ($1,800) for a top of the range model, they explain. Some of the stranger costs are for carbon fiber paddles, which break frequently on rocks. Seconders often throw spare paddles from bridges to the racers below.
The paddlers are more frightened of water hyacinth than the Inanda Dam. Thieves stole a cable holding the river weeds a few days before. Organizers had to think fast. Their solution was to drive a speedboat to make a channel through the choking weeds. With weeds overcome, the race is set for the final day.
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Day 3
The unforgiving heat roasts on the final day. Although it is a much shorter distance, it is by far the most exciting with nine rapids, says Swarbreck. Another disadvantage for the leaders is that they must wait for the entire field to begin, before they can paddle on.
At 10:45AM, with temperatures well into 30 degrees, Birkett and Zondi leave the Inanda Dam with a nine-minute lead. The winners take no chances with the rapids and opt to use the optional portages—that is getting out of the water and carrying the canoe rather than risk foundering on the rocks.
Danger lurks in the water. A number of canoes shatter and sink in the rapids of Day 3. In 6th place, Jacques Theron and Shaun Griffen’s canoe splits in half on the rocks of the Tops Needle Rapids, a few kilometers into the day. They are seen running on the road, carrying half a canoe each, near Molweni Causeway, half an hour later. No one knew where they were going or what they were doing. A seconder comes to help but the two turn them away. Four and a half hours later they cross the finish line in Durban on foot.
There is also danger out of the water. Children pelt Anna Adamova and her partner Abby Addie, second in the female category, with stones 20 kilometers from the end of the race. Adamova finishes the race with blood pouring down her face. She goes for emergency care after the finish line.
That sums up the grit you need to survive the Dusi, Africa’s ultimate adventure race. Surely the soldier paddler Ian Player would have approved.

Tag: Msunduzi River

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