Abbey Miedema won her first Drak title in a relentless display of domination for an emphatic victory on day two of the Hansa Powerade Drakensberg canoe marathon on Sunday.
Abbey’s nearest competition in the two-day, three-and-a-half hour battle was Laura Thompson, who came in second just under ten minutes later, a slim thirty second in front of Epworth school girl Robyn Kime who finishing third.
Miedema’s victory also completed a rare hat trick of SA K1 river titles for the Cape Town based athlete following her three successive Dusi titles.
“I’m not sure if it is the first time that it’s been done, but it’s nice to have three K1 wins on different rivers,” Abbey told gsport today.
“The race organisers shortened the course because the river was so low, so it was quite a low technical level, it was quite fun, very forgiving if you could drive quite well, you got through for an unscathed race.”
A strikingly large number of junior paddlers fared well in the race, most significantly the third place overall in the women’s race by Pietermaritzburg schoolgirl Robyn Kime, simultaneously comprehensively winning the Junior Girls division.
“She definitely is one of the better junior lady paddlers there have been for quite a while,” Abbey said afterwards. “She’s got good potential, she’ll definitely improve with time. It’s good for the sport to have youngsters coming up.”
The race was run in low river conditions, which suited the lighter paddlers better, as a result of dearth of rainfall for the past fortnight on which the Umzimkulu depends solely on its water.
The race organisers were forced to shorten the race by 15 kilometers to eliminate the notorious Valley of a Thousand Rapids which was impassable in the low river conditions.
The race was started at the Trout Hatcheries with a 35 kilometer first stage ending at Callaway bridge, resulting in a short 18 kilometer stage to the race finish at Early Mists farm.
A record field of 945 paddlers entered the event mostly in K1’s and participated in a full program of events throughout the weekend.
Summary of Results: Hansa Powerade Drakensberg Challenge SAK1
Women:
1.Abbey Miedema (Whr) 3:29.56
2.Laura Thompson( Nat) 3:39.34
3.Robyn Kime (Epk) 3:39.52
4.Hilary Pitchford (Ukn) 3:42.33
5.Kirsty van der Merwe (Ghr) 3:42.43
Junior Girls:
1.Robyn Kime (Epw) 3:39.52
2. Abie Adie (Epw) 3:52.16
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