Professional kitesurfer Anke Brandt has broken her own record for the world’s longest surf by a female rider when she rode overnight from Bahrain to Doha.
The Bahrain resident covered 298km (161 nautical miles) in 17 hours, which is 47km longer than a world record she set two years ago when she circumnavigated Bahrain in 12 hours.
However unlike the last trip the destination changed mid-journey due to some inclement weather in the Persian Gulf.
“In the end it came down to human versus machine,” the 2014 Red Bull Legend award winner revealed to Sport360. “The human was ready to go to (original destination port) Abu Dhabi but the support boat was not able to because it would have been too dangerous in the high winds.
“We also encountered periods of stagnation where there was no wind at all and we just floated around which cost us a lot of time. But that is the beauty of Mother Nature and that is a challenge in itself.
“In the end we had to make a call and headed into Doha way earlier than I wanted to as I was ready to go a lot further.”
The trip was an intense physical examination for the athlete but she explains that controlling mental fatigue was even more important in a grueling challenge of this nature.
“I like to promote that you have to challenge yourself and I wanted to figure out where my limit was.
“I found that if you are mentally prepared and you do what you love you can go a lot further than you ever expect you can.”
The inspiration behind Brandt’s impressive feats of endurance with her kite is the Wings for Life foundation, which undertakes research for spinal cord injuries.
“So far we have raised a bit more than US$1500 which is amazing. The goal is US$5500, which is equal to the amount of kilometers I want to do, the trip from Bahrain to Abu Dhabi.
“Last time I went around Bahrain I raised US$2500 and I went 250km. So we want to raise more money and as we are not there yet, our mission is not finished.”
With such a burning desire to challenge herself and raise money for a good cause, it’s a fair bet that Brandt will have a hat-trick of world records by the end of 2016.
