Dusi organisers aim to innovate and improve race with minor tweaks
For this year’s event, organisers have announced a couple of route changes to improve the race and ensure all competitors have a better all-round experience.
THE Dusi Canoe Marathon may be one of KwaZulu-Natal’s oldest and most iconic sporting events, but that does not stop the organising committee from still giving entrants what they want from the three-day classic.
The 2024 race takes place from February 15 to 17, and the event organisers announced a couple of route changes to improve the race and ensure all competitors have a better all-round experience.
The new start venue for the 2024 Dusi Canoe Marathon at Bishopstowe Hall was announced last year, and now, it has also been confirmed that the finish of the opening stage, and thus the start of the second stage, has also been moved about 6km downstream.
One of the traditional portages has also been removed with the corresponding stretch of river around Finger Neck now a compulsory paddle for all paddlers.
The finish of the opening stage will now be above the confluence between the Umgeni and Msunduzi rivers, about 100m after the put-in for the Second Saddles Portage.
Related article: Start venue confirmed for Dusi 2024
The altered Day 1 start and finish and new Day 2 start mean the distances for all three days are about 35km or 36km.
For organising committee chairman Steve Botha, the changes are simply part of the process of improving the race and ‘listening to what the paddlers want’.
“The paddlers have come to us with suggestions, and as much as possible, we try to accommodate what the competitors want. Having moved the start because of the not-so-clean water, the first day was a bit short. We took out over 10 kays of the first day last year, and the winners finished within two hours, so it was just too short. Secondly, the second day has always been notoriously long. A lot of people that were maybe not as fit as they thought they would be, opted not to do the Dusi because the second day was such a long day – it took six or seven, or even eight hours, for some people.
“Now a lot of people are looking at the shorter second day as a positive and are saying, ‘Yeah, you know what, we can finish 35 kays on the second day in that heat’. Obviously, the heat is another thing. In February, the heat is huge, and many people used to get dehydrated on that second day. So those are some of the reasons that we changed it and moved the first day finish. This hasn’t been something that’s only come about through the organisers making a decision on what we want,” Botha said.
He added that the feedback from the paddlers has been positive.
“At the end of the day, all we are doing is listening to the paddlers and hearing what they would like to see out of the race, and then, as much as possible, we try and accommodate what they want.”
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