Fish Hoek High matric pupil Mark Keeling teamed up with KwaZulu-Natal matric pupil Mpilo Zondi to win the male junior section of the gruelling two day Dusi Canoe Marathon from Pietermaritzburg to Durban.
The race was held from Thursday February 18 to Saturday Februrary 20.
Mark’s coach, Pete Cole, the husband of a former Fish Hoek High pupil Alexa Lombard who has won the race’s female category, and Mpilo’s coach, Martin Dreyer, a multiple overall winner of the Dusi who runs the Change a Life Academy, decided last year to team up their two paddlers.
During the canoe marathon, Mark and Mpilo had a great day one and led the junior category by 15 minutes. They broke their boat badly on day two and were fortunate to be able to finish the stage after two duct tape repairs on the river bank. They finished the day 25 seconds behind the new junior leaders after the combined two days. Day three on Saturday they had a good day and fin- ished the race winning the junior male category by 10 minutes overall.
