Anxious paddlers are facing the prospect of a gruelling Isuzu Berg River Canoe marathon after Cape weather failed to provide rains for the event for the second year running.
With the race now featuring an hour long time trial on the day before the race, conditions are sure to favour the lighter and nimbler athletes, particularly those adept at quick potages around the many tree blocks in the river.
”It’s bitterly low”, said one of the race favourites Graeme Solomon. ”The rains have not arrived, and the river has been dropping steadily over the past week. Everyone is feeling really nervous, and anticipating another epic,” he added.
Last year, the failure of the traditionally reliable Cape winter rains left the Berg river at its lowest race level ever, and desperate organisers had to move the start 20km downstream, as the river was not paddleable through the tight, tree-infested section below Paarl.
This year, the race organisers have scotched rumours that they plan to do the same, and confirmed that the race will start in Paarl at 8.30am on Wednesday morning, an hour earlier than usual.
The new Tuesday time trial, which will see 57 paddlers taking to the low river at 2pm, will decide the seeding in the front row of the first batch.
”I don’t know how important the time trial will be”, said Solomon. ”It’s going to be a five hour first day, so it doesn’t really matter where about on the first row you start. I reckon it’s mostly psychological,” he added.
The four day classic, from Paarl to Velddrift spans around 230km, and has in recent years hosted some ding dong battles between Solomon and defending champ Jacques Theron. Add the presence of Hank McGregor to the equation, and a fascinating duel in testing circumstances should be on the cards.
Mynhardt Marais has taken the 11th hour decision to withdraw as a result of a finger infection, while there is also some uncertainty on the participation of Peter Cole.
In the women’s race, all signs point to Abbey Miedema stepping up to the top spot on the podium, after challenging valiantly for this honour against Berg queen Alexa Lombard, who will not be racing due to her world marathon championship commitments at the end of the month. — Sapa