The Victoria Lake Canoe Club hosted a Berg training race, a long, tough endurance event, on June 14.
The 40km race was held as preparation for paddlers training for the Berg River Race, a 220km four-day ultra-marathon event.
The Berg River Race is the longest canoe race in South Africa and takes place annually from Paarl to the West coast, through the Cape winelands and scenic, mountainous beauty, in the middle of the wet and windy cold Cape winter, in mid-July.
The Chilli-Bite race, which provided hot soup or hot chocolate to all finishers afterwards, attracted 23 single canoes and six doubles, for the three to four and a half hour slog.
Newer and less fit Paddlers, who simply wanted the additional mileage training for stamina and endurance improvement, also had a shorter, 18km race incorporated.
Many of these paddlers are striving for river race points towards A grade status, in order to do the major A grade river races later in the year, as well as the Dusi, in February 2015.Category winners were pleased with their Spar gift vouchers and lucky draw prizes provided by Alclad, Ola ice cream and Austrian Baking, Brew and Braai.
Among the winners was Shaun Maphanga, from Florida Lake Canoe Club, who finished in three hours and one minute; the first junior, Johan Ubbink, from Centurion, with a time of three hours and 13 minutes; young Alex Masina, the first u-16 finisher from Johannesburg Canoe Club, and Anya Botes, an u-16 female, also from Centurion.
While the paddlers from the local canoe club were mostly involved with organising, safety/rescue and river marshalling positions, Berg trainees Grant Conlon and James Tutton finished in three hours, 23 and 25 minutes, respectively, in the first and second sub master age category, in 10th and 11th position overall.
Conlon is a stalwart who has participated in nearly 20 Berg River marathon events, seldom missing the endurance challenge.
The river race season is in full swing as paddlers begin training for the major A grade river races in spring, when the rains swell the rivers, and novice paddlers master basic river skills, while the currents are gentle and mild, and river levels low.
