AMONG the huge field of paddlers that will converge on Camps Drift before dawn on Thursday 16 February for the start of the FNB Dusi Canoe Marathon will be four times champion John Edmonds, poised to become only the eighth person to complete the tough 120km odyssey from Pietermaritzburg to Durban 40 times.

“I am just happy that I have survived this long,” joked Edmonds, who will take on the race with his brother-in-law Colin Casalis. “It is just wonderful to have had the opportunity to put forty years together where work commitments or sickness or injury haven’t prevented me from doing it.”

The 56-year-old Durban North paddling enthusiast has raced the Dusi every year since his debut, with only one blemish on his copybook that prevented him finishing the annual pilgrimage down the uMsundusi and uMngeni Rivers to Blue Lagoon.

“That was in 1990 when my brother Andrew and I were leading at Guinea Fowl on Day One in a great toe-to-toe dice with Graeme Pope-Ellis and Tim Cornish, and I pulled my shoulder dragging the boat down the portage. Although we finished second on that day, I couldn’t start the next day.

“At the time I didn’t know whether it was the right decision not to paddle on an injury like that,” mused Edmonds. “I do regret it. With hindsight, there was still an opportunity as quite a few guys made mistakes. But it is just a blip on the radar.”

Edmonds won the race in 1985 for the first time, and repeated that K1 triumph in 1989 and 1991, a spread during the reign of “Dusi King” Graeme Pope-Ellis’ competitive days that earned him the moniker “The Dusi Prince”. He went on to earn a fourth title in a K2 race with Kevin White in 1994.

Edmonds said he was really looking forward to his race with Casalis. “It will be our third race together. We will just aim at getting to the finish and I’ll tick that 40th one off when get there,” he said.