Gideon Swart is running 75km through the Cape Winelands to raise awareness about Human Trafficking in South Africa and to support Brave to Love.
Cape Winelands, South Africa (20 September 2022) – Gideon Swart, a Pretoria resident with a passion for running, is pairing that with his love to do some good. He is taking on the challenging 75km 2022 K-Way SA MaxiRace Cape Winelands to raise awareness for the plague of human trafficking that is taking place in South Africa.
A topic not often discussed in South Africa is human trafficking, yet it is a prevalent crisis. Human trafficking brings in more money than the illegal drug trade and is showing no signs of slowing down, with girls as young as ten being sold into slavery, many times by their own families.
Gideon hopes to use his run to raise awareness and funds for Brave to Love, an organisation working to end human trafficking in South Africa.
“I will be running to raise awareness for the work Brave to Love are doing in the human trafficking arena,” says Gideon Swart.
“Their mission is to rescue, recover, rehabilitate, restore and re-integrate women and girls that have become victims of sex trafficking in the sex trade in our country, our continent and our world. This is done through providing medical, psychological, emotional, physical, and mental support to those women that have been vulnerable and ended up as slaves in the sex trade.”
Having always been active, Gideon wanted to use his sports training as a tool for good. It was from this that he decided to use sporting challenges as a way to raise awareness for critical issues. In April this year, he was on the start line for the 2022 Ironman African Championship, having never cycled further than 100km or run further than 30km at a time!
“I love trail running, so when I saw MaxiRace Cape Winelands, I knew this would be my next event!” explains Swart. “I have never run a trail running race, nor ever run 75km on a trail route, but I am super excited to not only take part but also continue to spread the awareness of the work being done by Brave to Love.” Gideon is hoping to finish the route in under 12hrs.
“I hope that through this we are able to spread awareness and raise funds for Brave to Love, so that they can continue with their awesome work,” says Swart. “I don’t want anyone to live in fear, but I want people to know what is going on around them so that they are able to protect their children and loved ones.”
Since launching, Brave to Love has been instrumental in rescuing 56 women and children. If you want to learn more about Brave to Love, please visit https://bravetolove.org/.
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South Africa, We Have SO Much Good News to Share With You!For those wanting to participate in the K-Way MaxiRace Cape Winelands presented by Banhoek Chilli Oil, the event will take place on the 1st and 2nd of October 2022 in Stellenbosch and Franschhoek. A few entries for each of the distances are still available at http://maxirace.co.za/
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