Birkett and Zondi win Duzi

The pre-race favourites, who both endured forgettable final days 12 months ago in the K1 or singles classification, won the last stage of the doubles (K2) in a time of two hours, 13 minutes and 17 seconds for an overall time of 7:43.50.

Three-time world marathon champion Hank McGregor and partner Jasper Mocke came a distant second in an overall time of 7:53.59, but never really had any chance of victory after trailing by almost nine minutes two days into the 63rd edition of the three-day race.

Cam Schoeman and Czech rowing star Adam Jakub finished third with a combined time of 8:10.09.

Lance Kime and Thulani Mbanjwa completed possibly the most remarkable story of the world famous race by coming fourth (8:15.34).

Kime, last year’s winner, and Mbanjwa were 17th overall at the end of day one after breaking their boat at Commercial Weir, shortly after the start on day one.

Defending champions Robyn Kime and Abbey Ulansky won the women’s race for a third consecutive time after one of the closest races in history.

Kime took her overall titles to five and Ulansky added a remarkable ninth win to her name in the world famous 119,62-kilometre race.

Their winning time of 8:50.59 was just over a minute ahead of Ana Adamova and Abby Adie (8:52.06) with Haw sisters Tamika and Bianca (9:36.35) coming in third.

– Sapa