Extreme swimmer robbed at gunpoint at Constantia home

Kneeling on his bedroom floor, gagged, blindfolded and with a gun to his head, Ryan Stramrood kept thinking: “How does this end?”

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Cape Town - Kneeling on his bedroom floor, gagged, blindfolded and with a gun to his head, extreme swimmer Ryan Stramrood kept thinking: “How does this end?”

Moments earlier he had been ambushed by three men in their mid-20s while at his car, which was parked 40m from the front door of his home in a security complex in Constantia.

It was 5.50am on Saturday and he was putting stuff in his boot and about to head off to do a 20km swim when the three men, wearing hoodies, approached.

“They pushed me up against the car with a gun to my head and a knife in my side and said they wanted money.”

Stramrood, 42, found out afterwards the men had cut a hole in the complex’s electric fence and broken into a car before attacking him.

The fence’s automatic alarm system had apparently failed.

“The guys asked who I lived with and I told them I lived alone - lucky my 4-year-old son wasn’t there.”

The robbers used his remote to turn off the house’s alarm, and while one held a gun to his head, the others ransacked his home, all the time asking for gold and money. The men spoke in English and Afrikaans.

“I kept telling myself to stay cool. I was very subservient - I wasn’t trying to be a hero.”

He pleaded with them not to take his phone, telling them it had a tracking device.

Stramrood tried negotiating with them until they ripped one of his shirts and gagged him.

“They took another shirt and tied it tightly around my eyes. I felt like I was suffocating.”

They also tied his hands and feet with shoelaces, so tightly that his blood supply was cut off.

More than 20 minutes after the ordeal began, he heard the bedroom door lock and the men leaving with his belongings, including a computer with 20 years of back-up drives, and music equipment.

“I got the blindfold off and the gag and saw my phone lying on the bed.”

He called the police and his swimming friend Kieron Palframan.

Ironically, the police couldn’t access the security complex because Stramrood was locked in his bedroom and couldn’t let them in.

“They rang on a number of doorbells and eventually a neighbour let them into the complex.”

Several hours later, Stramrood swam from Robben Island to Blouberg in one hour and 51 minutes - his personal best.

“Kieron said I needed to channel this energy into something positive, which I did.”

The adventurer, who has swum throughout the world, said he wouldn’t let the experience get the better of him.

“You always wonder how you will react in these situations and now I know.

“I’m unhurt and I think I’m extremely lucky to be alive.”

Diep River Police spokesman Warrant Officer Keith Chandler reportedly said there had been a few other house robberies in Constantia using the same modus operandi.

Police have asked that anyone with information contact DetectiveWarrant Officer Steven Young at 021 710 7342.

helen.bamford@inl.co.za

Cape Argus