SA Olympic swimmer, Troyden Prinsloo of Durban, became the first South African swimmer to win the Nelson Mandela Bay Bell Buoy Challenge on Saturday morning. Near perfect swimming conditions greeted the swimmers as they set off from Hobie Beach on an 8km swim which took them to the nautical marker some 2.5km off-shore and back. Prinsloo, the South African 10km open water champion and former USA NCAA champion, led from start to finish bagging over R2,000 in hot spot prizemoney and the R7,500 winners purse.
Rated as one of the toughest open water swims in the World, the Bell Buoy Challenge attracted in excess of 50 of South Africa’s most hardened open water swimmers, with over 30% of the field coming from outside of Port Elizabeth. Prinsloo’s time of 1hr 31min improved the previous course record set by Bulgarian world champion Petar Stoychev in 2010 by 2min 36sec. Top Cape Town open water swimmer, Philip Emslie, was second in 1:36:08 with SA 25k Champion Tyron Venter in 3rd place in 1:37:47.
The outcome of the ladies race was a repeat of 2011 with Cape Town’s Dominic Dryding and Durban’s Nicole Brits swimming shoulder to shoulder the whole way and then sprinting out the water with Dryding successfully defending her title in a time of 1:43:53 with Brits just 7 seconds back. The America open water marathon swimmer Jen Schumacher placed 3rd in 1:54:34.
The first Port Elizabeth swimmers to complete the swim were Jonathan Roux in 5th place overall (1:48:04) and Tammy Geyer, 4th overall in the ladies race (1:54:57). In the wetsuit division Port Elizabeth swimmer Brendan Creighton won in 1:52:50 from Howard Loftus and Andrew Stone whilst PE’s Denise Bosman won the ladies wetsuit swim from visiting American Denise Everitt and local girl Mary-Anne Stott.
Rob Connacher, at 78 years old, was the oldest competitor to finish the swim, finishing in a time of 2:46 whilst Jeffreys Bay swimmer Brenton Williams became the first swimmer to complete the 8km Bell Buoy Challenge swimming Butterfly.
Brenton Williams (butterfly) rounding the Buoy
Troyden Prinsloo (men’s winner) finishing
Dominic Dryding (ladies winner) – rounding the Bell Buoy
Rob Connacher (oldest participant – 78yrs) rounding the buoy
Jonathan Roux (first local swimmer) rounding the buoy
The Winners, back row Chief Referee, Neville Smith, Philip Emslie, Tyron Venter, Jonathan Roux, Luke Nisbet, Dominic Dryding, Troyden Prinsloo, organiser Mike Zoetmulder. Front Row; Tammy Geyer, Maria Stott, Jen Schumacher and Nicole Brits.
Full results of the 2012 Bell Buoy Swim Challenge – Saturday 7th April 2012:
Men
1 Troy Prinsloo (Dbn) 1:31:11, 2 Philip Emslie (CT) 1:36:08, 3 Tyron Venter (Gauteng) 1:37:47, 4 Luke Nisbet (Dbn) 1:43:12, 5 Jonathan Roux 1:48:04, 6 Bevan Manson (EL) 1:53:35, 7 Pj Duffy 2:00:59, 8 Roger Finch (Gauteng) 2:10:31, 9 Luke Wightman (CT) 2:17:03, 10 Russell Tucker 2:19:04, 11 Ralph West 2:20:49, 12 Tim Stiff (CT) 2:21:10, 13 Tian Van den heever (Gauteng) 2:27:17, 14 Dion Walters (CT) 2:35:16, 15 Justin Ryan 2:35:44, 16 Andrew Stewart 2:37:56, 17 Sian Okeeffe 2:41:33, 18 Roberto Novello (EL) 2:41:41, 19 Wayne Mukheibir 2:41:49, 20 Brenton Williams 2:46:20,21 Andre Kleynhans 2:50:07, 22 Jason Malick (USA) 2:50:55
Ladies
1 Dominique Dryding (CT) 1:43:53, 2 Nicole Brits (Dbn) 1:44:00, 3 Jen Schumacher (USA) 1:54:34, 4 Tammy Geyer 1:54:57, 5 Maria Stott 3:30:30
Wetsuit – Men
1 Brendan Creighton 1:52:50, 2 Howard Loftus 1:53:38, 3 Andrew Stone 1:56:37, 4 Kenneth Noble 1:57:14, 5 Richden Jute 2:06:05, 6 Dalen Davidson 2:11:31, 7 Iain Geddes 2:11:50, 8 Robert Geddes 2:13:09, 9 Ryan Pienaar 2:13:11, 10 Peter Marriott 2:15:05, 11 Philip Weddell 2:20:57, 12 Buzz Friday 2:29:42, 13 Stanford Slabbert 2:29:56, 14 Neil Trollip 2:30:37, 15 Charlie Hills 2:32:33, 16 Rob Connacher 2:46:18, 17 John Abbott 2:46:22, 18 Rob Ermes 3:11:45, 19 Jose Neves 3:21:49
Wetsuit – Ladies
1 Denise Bosman 2:21:37, 2 Denise Everitt (USA) 2:22:04, 3 Mary-anne Stott 2:30:53, 4 Val Beetham 2:35:45
