{"id":59278,"date":"2025-04-22T22:08:55","date_gmt":"2025-04-22T20:08:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/?p=59278"},"modified":"2025-04-22T22:12:56","modified_gmt":"2025-04-22T20:12:56","slug":"first-ever-paddle-fest-off-to-a-great-start-with-coaching-competitions-and-crowds","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/more-sport\/first-ever-paddle-fest-off-to-a-great-start-with-coaching-competitions-and-crowds\/","title":{"rendered":"First-ever Paddle Fest off to a great start with coaching, competitions, and crowds!"},"content":{"rendered":"

Paddle Fest 2025, running in Durban and the North Coast from 18 to 20 April, welcomed seasoned paddlers and interested newbies to the Durban Underwater Club for an epic first day! Spectators were treated to some top action as paddlers battled it out in the 800m Reef Shootout at Vetchies across 7 categories.<\/span><\/p>\n

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This three-day festival, organised by South Africa Surf Ski and sponsored by Engen Ballito and The Pumpsmith, includes the popular Engen Ballito Downwind on Sunday as the headliner, as well as hosting the KZN Singles Surf Ski Championships. The kick-off event was the Reef Shootout at Vetchies – a knockout format where paddlers raced out around some buoys, and back to the beach at DUC. The paddlers lined up in 7 categories, with each round knocking out others until the final 5, who raced in the final for a cash prize.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Durban paddling legend Luke Nisbet and Olympic paddler Tiffany Koch dominated the day, claiming victories in both the Long Distance Ski (Men\/Women) and Lifesaving Ski (Men\/Women) categories.<\/span><\/p>\n

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\u201cWe\u2019d like to congratulate all the competitors who participated in what was an amazing start to the first-ever Paddle Fest,\u201d said Barry Lewin, Event Organiser.<\/span><\/p>\n

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\u201cThis was a nail-biting event that gave spectators the opportunity to witness all the ocean-based action. We were also excited by the response to our free SASS Coaching Session ahead of the race, where people who\u2019ve never tried the sport were given some tips and expert insight. We hope this will open up paddling to a new group of people!\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

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Results of the Reef Shootout at Vetchies<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

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Long Distance Ski Men<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

1st: Luke Nisbet<\/span><\/p>\n

2nd: Luke O\u2019 Connor<\/span><\/p>\n

3rd: Jayden van Rensburg<\/span><\/p>\n

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Long Distance Ski Ladies<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

1st: Tiffany Koch<\/span><\/p>\n

2nd: Bronwyn Wissekerke<\/span><\/p>\n

3rd: Tracy Nuss<\/span><\/p>\n

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Long Distance Ski over 40 Men<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Clinton Wissekerke<\/span><\/p>\n

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Long Distance Ski over 40 Women<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Tracy Nuss<\/span><\/p>\n

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Long Distance Ski Junior Men<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Luke O\u2019 Connor<\/span><\/p>\n

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Long Distance Ski Junior Ladies<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Tessa Salmon<\/span><\/p>\n

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Lifesaving Ski Men<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

1st: Luke Nisbet<\/span><\/p>\n

2nd: Gal Marks<\/span><\/p>\n

3rd: Daniel Manihan<\/span><\/p>\n

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Lifesaving Ski Ladies<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

1st: Tiffany Koch<\/span><\/p>\n

2nd: Dayna Deeble<\/span><\/p>\n

3rd: Mikaela Brown<\/span><\/p>\n

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Lifesaving Ski Junior Men<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Gal Marks<\/span><\/p>\n

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Lifesaving Ski Junior Women<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Dayna Deeble<\/span><\/p>\n

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Academy Race<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

1st: Craig Clelland<\/span><\/p>\n

2nd: Shannon Buys<\/span><\/p>\n

3rd: Rebecca Sands<\/span><\/p>\n

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Double Men’s<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

1st: Luke O\u2019 Connor and Jayden van Rensburg<\/span><\/p>\n

2nd: Kwanele Banda and Senzo Ngcobo<\/span><\/p>\n

3rd: Daniel Manihan and Adrian Todd<\/span><\/p>\n

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Doubles Ladies<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

1st: Mikaela Brown and Dayna Deeble<\/span><\/p>\n

2nd: Madison Alberts and Catrina Horner<\/span><\/p>\n

3rd: Lynn Bennett and Claire Spring<\/span><\/p>\n

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Don\u2019t Miss Any Paddle Fest Action!<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

With Durban awarded the 2025 ICF Canoe Ocean Racing World Champs from 17 to 19 October, the Paddle Fest organisers included a preview of the race course, culminating in the headline event \u2013 the Engen Ballito Downwind on Sunday.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Saturday, 19 April<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

9am: World Champs Course Preview from DUC to Westbrook\/Toti \u2013 Organisers will prioritise downwind paddling but this is a great way to check out the course ahead of the October event.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Sunday, 20 April<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

9am: Engen Ballito Downwind from Blythedale to Tiffany\u2019s and reverse \u2013 The Paddle Fest culminates in this 18.5km course.<\/span><\/p>\n

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The KZN North Coast local and former World Champion Hank McGregor is among this year\u2019s competitors. Commenting ahead of the Sunday race, he said: \u201cI\u2019m super excited to be lining up again in the Engen Ballito Downwind. There are some great new events on the calendar, and I\u2019m really thrilled to be part of Paddle Fest 2025. I\u2019m looking forward to racing some of the best in KZN!\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

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There is no pre-entry required for Day Two of Paddle Fest. To enter the Engen Ballito Downwind, visit <\/span>www.canoesa.org.za<\/span><\/a><\/span>.<\/span><\/p>\n

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<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Paddle Fest 2025, running in Durban and the North Coast from 18 to 20 April, welcomed seasoned paddlers and interested newbies to the Durban Underwater Club for an epic first day! Spectators were treated to some top action as paddlers battled it out in the 800m Reef Shootout at Vetchies across 7 categories. \u00a0 This […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":59277,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[4415],"class_list":["post-59278","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-more-sport","tag-olivia-jones-communications"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59278","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=59278"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/59278\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/59277"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=59278"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=59278"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=59278"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}