Dutch athlete Els Visser claimed her maiden women’s title at New Zealand’s Ironman in Taupō on Saturday, but her visit here was also a chance to catch up with someone she survived a different kind of ordeal with.
On Monday, she met up with Gaylene Wilkinson in Nelson, and it wasn’t your ordinary meeting.
The last time Els and Gaylene were together was in 2014. after they had been rescued from a deserted island in Indonesia.
Visser was completing a medical placement in Bali. Gaylene and her partner, Tony, were on holiday. All three were on the boat going between islands when it hit a reef and later started to sink in the night.
“When it finally looked like it was going to go, we had to abandon it. The only lifeboat was a little six-person dingy, and there were 25 of us,” said Gaylene.
As the sun started to rise, the group spotted an island in the distance. Gaylene and Els made the decision to start swimming, but as the waves grew stronger, they became separated from the others – including Gaylene’s partner.
“It was really a state of survival... just make it toward the island; the only thing we could think of was just swim,” said Els.
Swimming for hours, the two women made it to the island and continued to be in survival mode until their miracle rescue. A stray fishing boat had decided to check out a site nearby and spotted them.
“I wouldn’t have survived by myself,” said Els.
“It was a huge relief, of course, a fairly desperate situation; we hadn't seen anybody in 24 hours, so we couldn't even think about a rescue.”
And there was to be another miracle – Gaylene was united with Tony at a local police station.
In 2014 1News met Gaylene and Tony at the Auckland airport on their arrival, where they said they were going home to watch the All Blacks.
On the other side of the world, Els took up running to deal with the accident. That would kick start a professional career in triathlon – that now sees her as one of the best Iron Women in the world.
It’s such a remarkable story, Els delivered a Ted Talk on it in 2018.
“I think that's what helps me now in some races when I'm having really tough moments, and sometimes I think about (the shipwreck) moment that I've experienced worse,” she said.
And she was reminded of that moment while racing on Saturday. Gaylene’s brother was in Taupō watching the race and sending live updates to Gaylene.
“I was in a really hard moment, a tough moment on my third lap of running. I was already having that mental struggle in my head, and then I heard someone say “Gaylene says go!!!” and I was like, oh man, I can't give up; I really have to keep going, so yeah, that definitely helped, it was funny as well,” Els laughed.
Behind the front runners in the 3.8km swim, Els came flying out of the 180km bike to pass New Zealand’s defending champion Hannah Berry, and lead the charge for the whole 42.2km run, to claim the title in 9hr, 05 min and 44 seconds.
Els is staying with Gaylene for a few days at her property in Golden Bay, with a well-deserved rest on the cards.
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