Mayah Potgieter on fire for iLembe
She faced off against high quality opponents in eThekwini's Gia Gillmer, Cape Winelands' Anastasia Venter and Buffalo City's Gemma Hanafey.
iLembe’s Mayah Potgieter saved her best for last at the South African Junior Surfing Championships, winning gold in the girls U16 event.
The 16-year-old from Uvongo, who surfs for iLembe by choice, held off strong national competition to win her first SA title at a packed lower point break in Jeffrey’s Bay on Sunday.
“My first heat really didn’t start well, so it was all uphill from there and I just wanted to get through repos and have some fun,” said Potgieter.
Repos is an opportunity for surfers who did not make it out of the initial heat to get back into the competition.
But once she had qualified, Potgieter was ready to give it her all in her fourth SA championships, where she had never medalled before.
“I honestly didn’t expect to go far in the competition with such strong girls in my age group. So I just had the freedom to enjoy myself and if it went well, then I could take it round by round,” she said.
Photo: Mike Ruthnum/MrImagesJbay.
In both the quarter- and semi-finals, Potgieter was pushed until the very end, needing scores of 11.70 and 11.73 to grab second place in both, advancing into the grand final on Sunday.
There she faced off against high quality opponents in eThekwini’s Gia Gillmer, Cape Winelands’ Anastasia Venter and Buffalo City’s Gemma Hanafey.
“It was so slow out there and we really didn’t have good surf for our final. It took until 12 minutes left in the heat before someone caught their first wave!” she said.
It became a contest of patience and who could best adapt to the elements, with only nine waves caught between the four finalists.
Potgieter made the best of her two, a 4.83 and 4.17 (9.0 total), to win by a comfortable one-and-a-half point margin ahead of Venter (7.50) and Hanafey (6.67).
“It was the most incredible feeling to come out as the winner, particularly with it being so unexpected.
“The whole team was there on the beach and I could not have asked for better support throughout.”
She flew the iLembe flag high and was the only member of the team to reach a final in all age groups.
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