It’s rather fitting that SA’s gold medal-winning tug-of-war team at this year’s world championships in Mannheim, Germany all came from a school named Oakdale Agricultural School.
That is because despite their class being Under-18, these champions were all boys, yet men and all as strong as oak trees in the Closed Division.
It’s the third year on the trot that Oakdale have uprooted all opponents before them, and this time it was a Chinese Taipei team on the losing end of the rope.
They say it takes a village to raise a team — in this case it’s both a case of towns and a school hostel.
Coach Piet Lourens lives in Riversdale where Oakdale is situated, manager Abrie de Wet comes from Caledon and team captain Lourens Brand’s home is in Swellendam.
The common thread is the fact that the young competitors are all boarders at the school hostel.
Says coach Lourens: “I’m a dairy farmer here opposite the school but originally I’m from Swellendam — where everyone does tug-of-war, from primary through high school, even farm schools.
“My dad bought the farm here opposite Oakdale in 1998 and about three years later the parents of children who were still at school in Swellendam, but registered for high school at Oakdale, asked me to get involved at Oakdale because tug-of-war wasn’t a thing at Oakdale.”
In hindsight, those parents were on to a good thing because as early as 2005 the school won their first world championships and the sport took off like a wildfire.
At this year’s world champs Lourens was involved with both the U18 schools side and the SA U23 side that took part in the open section and grabbed gold as well.
“The school team are easier to coach as they’re almost a professional side, they all live together, train together, the only thing is they don’t get paid,” he laughs.
In the year before world champs, the U18 side trained every day for at least three hours (90min gym work and the same time on the rope).
And Lourens says the margin between gold and silver was incredibly close and came down to as little as two minutes of training.
“I swear if we had trained two minutes less than we did we wouldn’t have won... the final was incredibly hard, temperatures of 30-34ºC and 90% humidity.
“At home we pull mainly on grass but this was predominantly in sand so it involved long, long pulls and our final took 48 minutes, which is very long in tug-of-war terms.”
Like so many SA sports teams, the squad was largely self-funded. “The cost was at least between R40,000 and R45,000 per person. We don’t get state support, minimal support from provincial government but we worked hard to raise funds from auctions, fundraising functions, dance-events, selling boerewors rolls etc, parents’ contributions and some funding from private institutions.”
He says tug-of-war is hopeful that new Sports Minister Gayton McKenzie has taken note, “he looks very positive about youth and sport so maybe things will change”.
Team captain Lourens Brand is a humble, yet confident 16-year-old.
“I see my role as captain as keeping the guys full of courage and positivity at all times. This is the second year I’ve taken part in world champs so that helps a bit.
“My experience helps and to pass that over to the team... I know what to expect so I can stay calm and keep the team calm at all times. And then ‘Oom’ Piet helps so much from the side, he can see how the other team are pulling, but we also have to have someone on the rope and that’s where I come in.
“This field was so soft that we couldn’t use pure power, it was very tactical and we had to hang in for long periods, making the other team weaker and it came down to who was the fittest.”
The Bellville-born skipper first took up the sport after watching his nephew compete and is in it for the long haul.
“I’m in Grade 11 now and when I finish school I want to go and work in America but my eye is very much on competing for SA at U23 level at the 2026 World Championships because we’re hosting it on home soil in Hartenbos, Mossel Bay.”
As for Abrie de Wet, being manager he has to ensure everything comes together without hitches and he’s been involved with the victorious U18 team in one way or other for the past three world champs.
“Piet [Lourens] and I go back a long way because my children competed and he and I have worked well for the last three years especially.”
Like Lourens, he’s also a farmer, but in Caledon where he works with sheep and grain. “I can’t be at Oakdale as much as I’d like because it’s a 170km trip but I’m there for weekends and competitions.
“My role was to help with fundraising projects etc and to get the teams entered properly, make sure the children’ clothes are all right, with sponsors’ names etc and all the logistics/transport while we were over there and I also helped with the coaching when he was involved with the other sides.”
It all gets quite technical when it comes to weights etc as De Wet explains.
“The weigh-in is on the Wednesday and we competed on the Sunday [the U18s]. In that team the lightest guy was 57kg and the heaviest about 91 but the average per person had to be 70kg.
“We weighed in at 554kg... 6kg under the limit which was good. And then by the time of competition we were about 611kg so a few of the children put on close to 10kg in that period — that’s the secret of dieting correctly so one can get that extra strength.”
One thing that’s not a secret is that Oakdale has had that global winning formula for the past three years and if they all keep pulling together who’s to say it won’t be four in a row this time next year?
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