In the bag

Dusi 2010 – done and dusted! We had a good day today, shot everything except Top’s Needle and Island 1and 2. Water was great, weather was cool enough for most of the race and the mood in the boat was as upbeat as ever. Although we shot all the big rapids fine, we had two swims in the most arbitrary places – one in the Kindergarten rapids where we temporarily lost a paddle and took a while to locate it trapped under the rapid in rocks, and the second under a large tree stump in fast flowing water, but not a rapid! The second swim just above Dog’s Leg could have been very nasty. I tried to cross the main current to get to a small sneak channel, but didn’t have enough boat speed to get across and ended up being pushed against and under the roots of a fallen tree. Fortunately we didn’t get snagged up and after a fairly long swim in the deep water managed to drag our way through the weeds on the side and get into the boat and on our way.

We finished the day in 3h33 for a total time of 13h37 which I was fairly chuffed with. Greg had a great race and was very strong on the water, only fading slightly on the very long haul over the dam at the end of day two. He was stable in the rapids and good company. I was fine for the most part in the bigger water, have a few bad habits to work on, but I need to work especially hard on my concentration and decision making when on the easier parts of the river.

So, it’s on to the Non-stop which is on the 12th February, and the good news is that Non-stop partner Charles had a great Dusi with Drew Wilson and is looking fit and strong for the race. They managed a 3h07 final day for a 12h08 Dusi!

Thanks so much to all those who sponsored us per mile or made donations! The Sunflower Fund really does do great work with this money.

Dusi Day Two

Day two in the bag! A great day, on a section of river that I've often had trouble with in the past. Greg's knees eased up for the Saddles portage and we managed to run some of it, we snuck the Washing Machine section on river left - I'm still a bit scarred from a previous BIG swim there, and the water level was pretty high once we reached the confluence of the Umgeni. Broke another paddle here - this time me!

The Numeni portage up was hot and steep as ever up, and running down the steep decline blew Greg's knees once more. But once back on the river we had an adrenaline rush of note, shot the Big Three - Gumtree, Thombo and Hippo only swimming in the pool at the bottom of Hippo. I have never taken such good lines in the section between Numeni and the dam before, and we were very quickly at the dam. A quick stop with Reg 'Super Second' Makepeace and my beautiful wife at the headwaters of the dam, and we were onto the hour long grind into the NE wind over Inanda. But with thoughts of cold Hansa in mind we blew through it and finished in a time of 5h18.

Only Day Three left, shorter at 36 km and some fun rapids. Sad it's nearly over - oh well Non-stop to look forward to in 3 weeks time!

Dusi Day One

We started with the 5th and final firing of the Natal Carbineer's cannon. We had a great opening sprint, and were 5th in our batch at the top of Ernie Pearce weir. Unfortunately we took an unscheduled swim at the bottom! We were great in the boat and managed to get to Campbell' portage without further incident and with some great lines - hardly touched a rock. On Campbell's came the knee test, and unfortunately Greg's knee was not up to it. It definitely took the pressure off though as it confined us to walking for the day's portages. We joined Dave Harker and Kendall Slater on an alternative route through Guinea Fowl portage, which turned out to be flatter, and avoided the chaos in Devil's Cauldron, but was probably lightly longer. Back on the water and following some mamba lines through The Maze, we finally found our second's at Mission - we had missed them at Ernie Pearce, Musson's and Campbell’s. The good paddling continued until the Cabbage tree take-out, where we managed to have our second swim and Greg broke a paddle. Luckily our seconds were close at hand and we got a spare and continued to the finish. Our time for the day was around 4h45, we still need to get our official time. Boat still in one piece and ready for tomorrow.

Dusi Time

It's time for Day one. We are off at 7h00. I'm predicting 4h30 as our time today. Will post later...

Hansa!

How are these bad boys? Limited edition, shiny black with personal photo, Dusi 2010 and paddling number on them. And I mean really limited - one six-pack of each. You can't say I don't look after you Greg. Thanks to Hansa and the guys at SABMiller.

The Recession is over

The recession is over! As measured by the bids for the Charity batch on this year’s auction, the downturn in the economy is over - it is obviously time to buy, buy, buy!

Last year the lowest bid that successfully got into the charity batch was around R1,500 so I thought my bid was pretty safe at R3,300 and I planned to log on and make sure sometime before the bidding closed at 16h00 on Saturday. Due to having some of our hard core friends around for a long, boozy lunch on Saturday all thoughts of checking on bids were long forgotten, until I got an urgent call from Charlie who was on his game. "Terry, do you know that you are the second lowest bid and the lowest is only R50 behind you?" Sobering fast, I gave Charles my login details and asked him to up my bid. A nervous minute or so went by as I we waited to see if my new bid had been accepted, but it hadn't! "Bidding closed" was the message and a small sweat broke as I waited to see if I'd hung in at the bottom of the bidding. I could just imagine the phone call to Dusi partner Greg to tell him we were starting in the later batches! Eventually the bid page refreshed and there we were - Boat 6909 still in 59th spot!

So, crises averted. We are in the 7h00 Charity batch, the weather is looking good (cool and rainy for Thurs) and the RECESSION IS OVER!

I had my last serious training run before the big day this morning and the body seems to be holding up. I am been forced to still get up at 4h30 and meet the boys for my Wednesday run as Wilko has promised some funding for The Sunflower Fund, got to do what you have to do for charity! Still holding thumbs that my partner is mending - on Thursday he wasn't up for the last CMH Dice as his wrist has joined both knees in objecting strongly to physical exercise. I think a few pain killers and the tales of the legendary Hansa Babes at the finish should get him through though, in fact here we go Greg...

1 Week To Go

The excitement is building, a week to go. Donations and pledges are starting to come in nicely, and by the time we start the race we should have raised a decent amount for The Sunflower Fund. Remember no donation is too small, together we can make a big difference!

The batches have just been put up on the Dusi site and we are scheduled to start at 7h50 for the first day. This will hopefully change to 7h00 if we make it into the charity batch which is auctioned off (closing on Saturday). This gives us a nice advantage as we start only 1 hour behind the leaders and should have most of the day done before it get's too hot. We will also be amongst the better paddlers up front, so hopefully shouldn't be knocked out our boat by novices taking crazy lines or getting stuck right in the main channels. The portages also tend to get a bit congested later in the day, especially the very steep, bushy and hot path through Devil's Cauldron - so it will be a bonus to get through there before the crowds.

Last CMH dice tonight at Kingfisher, and probably our last hard paddle before Dusi. See you there for a cold Hansa afterwards!

Last race before Dusi

Yesterday I did the CMH Inanda to Durban race, not with Greg (who was still away on Holiday - hopefully not eating too many mince pies)but with my cousin Charles. In February Charles and I are taking on the Stihl Non-stop Dusi, so this was our dress rehearsal. Level was a bit low, those Umgeni water guys are being ultra conservative with water although all the big dams on the Umgeni system (Midmar, Albert Falls and Inanda) are over 100% full. They only released around 13 cumecs, so it was a lot of bump and scrape over rocks in some sections, although other rapids were surprisingly good. Yours Truly took an unbelievable line at Five Fingers which cost me one broken paddle, but otherwise there wasn't too much drama. Hopefully this holding back as much water as they can will result in some big Dusi water, and hopefully even bigger water for Non-stop!

In other news; Greg did call me just now. He's back in town, reports that he had 4 good paddles in the last week on the Kei river, and that his knee is on the mend! Things are looking good! Can't wait - only 9 days to go...

50 Miler - Has Greg Peaked?

Well, what can I say...? We got through 50 Miler without any serious hiccoughs, although we did have a few silly swims. We had a swim down the very top of Mission rapid, barely 300 m from the start! Fortunately this time there was no boat damage, unlike the 2007 incident where my darling wife blessed our boat with her red blanket before the start and we wrapped it in half on Mission! I don't think my good mate and partner at the time, Fourteen has forgiven her yet.

What is of some concern is that Greg seemed to have peaked after this race. He was consistently doing 3 paddling and 3 running sessions a week prior to this, and now seems to have reduced it significantly! Could lead to a bit of suffering come the 21st of January when Dusi arrives...

Dusi 2010 - Making a difference

Time to make a difference! This year I am paddling Dusi with a good mate of mine from Maritzburg Varsity days, Greg Guye. He has recently returned to our shores with is family after 12 years on Mud Island working in a Bank in London along with all the othe Expats. Dusi starts in a mere 13 days time and we are looking to raise some cash for a very worthy cause.

We will be covering 75 miles (120kms) during the race in order to raise money and awareness for The Sunflower Fund. It only takes two test tubes of blood to become a donor but R1000 to tissue type this blood sample at the required level which is why fund raising is as essential as finding donors. All money raised will be used for tissue typing of potential donors. Please sponsor us and assist us contribute towards increasing the South African Bone Marrow Registry.

Bank Account Name: The Sunflower Fund
Bank: ABSA Bank
Account No.: 4051834719
Branch: Tokai
Branch Code: 632005
Reference: Terry Drummond 1 KZN

Please make any donations into the above account. I'll be sharing some of the training and qualifying on this blog along with reports from each of the three days.