Submitted by Janice Melville.
Dragon Boat Nationals – April 5th-6th, 2024
The New Zealand dragon boat Nationals were held at Lake Karapiro, Cambridge. The same place as the Festival last year. This year we had lovely weather on the Friday and Saturday. It got to about 28 degrees on the Saturday and no wind!
Our team was one of seven teams competing in the breast cancer standard boat division and one of nine completing in the small boat division. We had a very early start on the Friday morning, with blessing the boats and welcoming everyone we had the 2k race first. We were the second boat off, followed by the others at 15 second intervals. Next were the 200m small boat and 200m standard boat in the afternoon. That was a lot of racing – 7 races on Friday and 6 on Saturday which were the 500m races.
From lining up in crew marshalling, the banter between the teams was great cumulating with some very close racing between the teams. Everyone was fiercely competitive on the water but friendly off. Congratulations to all those that won medals and to Boobops Moana for taking the Graeme Rountree Trophy by winning the 500m final.
It’s great to catch up with the other teams. Being in the South Island, we don’t get the opportunity to catch up with the other BC teams at regattas and support each other.
Following the 500m final we had the flower ceremony. The seven boats rafted together with another two supporter boats linked together. This is always such a poignant experience. Following the ceremony our dragon boating family performed the Haka in our honour. Yet another emotional experience along with the paddle guard of honour as we came off the water.
Sunday morning we had the breast cancer brunch while listening to speeches from each teams new paddlers. It was very moving listening to their journeys and how they had joined their team. All the ladies who were new to dragon boating this season stood in a line at the front of the stage. Great to have new paddlers but a high cost to join our teams.
