Mhlengi Gwala: ‘Chainsaw Attack Won’t Stop Me Doing What I Love’

An Ironman is one of sport’s toughest challenges — requiring monster swims and bike rides and a marathon run — so just imagine wanting to do one after nearly losing your legs in a horrific chainsaw attack.

In March, Mhlengi Gwala was ambushed on an early morning training run in his native South Africa by three men who dragged him into bushes at gunpoint and tried to saw off his legs.

Remarkably, not only did the 27-year-old survive with both legs intact, he returned to running just four months later — with an iron will and an unbreakable spirit.

“I will do it soon, maybe after three or four years. As soon as I have fully recovered I will do it,” Gwala told BBC Sport Africa.

“I won’t sit in a house and lock myself in the doors because of them. I have to come out and do what I love.”

The jovial South African — who took up triathlon to battle alcohol issues — was one of his country’s top triathletes at the time.

‘I’m dying’

He believes his assailants, who targeted him between Chesterville and Mayville near the southern city of Durban, knew he was an athlete given his regular early morning training run in the area.

While violent crime may not be new to the Durban native, this was very different — and not just because he had a gun constantly held against his head.

“I’ve been robbed three times — with a gun and with a knife — so I was a bit scared,” he recalls. “But when they pulled the chainsaw, my mouth opened wide.”

The attackers cut into Gwala’s legs with what is thought to be a blunt chainsaw.

“I tried to ask what I did wrong but they didn’t reply. They were talking to themselves in a language I didn’t understand and started to grab my feet and cut my leg — as if they were cutting a tree.

“I was thinking: ‘I’m dying’ and that they [also] needed my head or my private parts.”

Thankfully, they didn’t.

Why did they attack him?

After a while, the attackers suddenly stopped and left — with the father-of-two believing that the chainsaw may have broken.

“When I was lying there [after they went], the pain was very much. Then I thought about my kids — that if I die, then they’ll never see me again.”

The thought helped Gwala get up, hop — on his left leg, which was in better shape than his right — and crawl back to the road, where he was rescued and taken to hospital.

To this day, he still has no firm understanding of why the attack happened, especially since none of his belongings were stolen.

“There’s a belief that if you take a body part from someone and mix it with another and go to a traditional healer, you get wealthy,” he suggested. “So it could be that or it could be jealousy.”

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