Cream rises to the top in tough surfski
conditions
Durban - The Easterly wind threw the cat amongst the pigeons for the fifth
race of the Marine Series on Friday night and saw the class paddlers prevail
in the penultimate leg of the popular Friday night surfski series.
Hank McGregor and Michelle
Burn reinforced their pedigrees with emphatic wins in the men's and women's
races, entrenching themselves as the cream of the crop in the world's
longest running surfski series.
McGregor cantered into the finish at Marine SLC and admitted that the
conditions hadn't been easy.
"Conditions were quite testing with the East blowing, but there was no big
swell so it was quite fun!," said McGregor. "The mass start was quite
exciting for me. I haven't had a mass start with all the doubles.
"It was great to test myself against my old partners Brandon and Grant van
der Walt, who were in a double ski.
"I managed to pull away from the start with the van der Walts and opened up
a gap on everyone else, and on the downwind leg I pulled away from them and
turned at the end of the first lap ahead of everyone."
"They pulled me back in the
side chop - they seemed to have more momentum in the double - and we came
together in the into-the-wind leg, but they were on my tail," said the Euro
Steel racer.
"We turned the final turn for the downwind leg and I managed to edge away
from them to take the win," said McGregor.
"We had a good laugh afterwards. Grant said that he has to match me in a
double whereas in the past we always used to paddle neck-and-neck in
singles," he added.
Burn was peerless in the testing conditions, racing home to win by almost
four minutes from rising star teenager Saskia Hockly.
The consistent star performer
Kwanele Banda won the short course race once again.
Race Six takes place on Friday night 26 March at 5:30pm.
SUMMARY OF RESULTS
MARINE SURFSKI SERIES RACE FIVE.
1 Hank McGregor 0:38:46.34
2 Grant Van Der Walt/Brandon Van Der Walt 0:39:38.75
3 Matthew Bouman 0:41:21.03
4 Jason Ekstrand/Richard Lowe 0:42:01.03
5 Bevan Manson 0:43:41.09
6 Paul Rabinowitz/Nic Burden 0:43:46.01
7 Gene Prato 0:43:47.00
8 Wade Krieger 0:44:15.19
9 Luke Symons/Michel De Rauville 0:44:21.62
10 Jean Luc Mauvis 0:44:42.92
11 Quinton Rutherford/Pippa McGregor 0:44:43.23
12 Brett Hadiaris 0:46:26.38
13 Matthew Coetzer 0:46:40.48
14 Benjamin Tarr/Kelly Tarr 0:46:40.94
15 Michelle Burn 0:46:55.76
16 Sebastian Garreau 0:46:59.10
17 Joshua Simpkins 0:47:03.03
18 Steve Cohen 0:47:20.87
19 Billy Harker/Pierre Carbonel 0:47:22.17
20 Shaun Burgin 0:47:33.72
WOMEN
1 Michelle Burn 0:46:55.76
2 Saskia Hockly 0:50:43.03
3 Tannah Smith 0:54:47.84
SHORT COURSE
1 Kwanele Banda 0:28:40.29
2 Malcolm Pitt/Kaiden Pitt 0:29:00.37
3 Nikki Aitken/Byron Mc Kie 0:30:44.60
4 Wandile Dube 0:30:55.32
5 Lunga Mngadi 0:30:58.56
6 Joshua Glyn-Cuthbert 0:31:22.61
7 Johannes Petrus Van Der Sandt/Tim O'Brien 0:31:30.19
8 Ayanda Dube/Lwandile Gasa 0:31:37.05
9 Louis Souchon 0:32:20.72
10 Reece Tredoux Truter 0:32:42.41
More information can be found at
www.marineseries.co.za
2021 Marine Surfski Series calendar:
Race 6: 26 March
ENDS
