Dragon Boat West

During my trip to Toronto/New York, I was introduced to Toronto's Wednesday night league races.  Basically they would race each week on that night for a set amount of weeks and be awards points each week depending on how they placed.  At the end of the season there would be a big race that would be open only to teams that have gained enough points.. .kinda like the playoffs...

I was wondering if there would be any interest in something like this over here?  How many teams would be interested in participating and helping out to organize it?  This is all hypothetical right now.. but if there's enough interest, I'd think it wouldn't be all that hard to organize.

I'm interested.

 
Hmmmm....maybe about 4?

Chaos,

Sounds like an interesting idea. What would be the minimum number of teams we would need?

And which four teams are you thinking of?


If it's going to be held on a weeknight like the one in Toronto.. then I'd say something manageable like 15 registered teams since we don't really want to race in the dark right? Since teams don't like the idea of giving up weekend practices, it will most likely be on a weeknight.

I'm just thinking that teams usually do race pieces during their practices anyways so spending one night a week doing a couple races wouldn't be all out of the ordinary. We would just need the equipment and volunteers.

Maybe we could do varying distances throughout the season... one week could be the usual 500m while another week could be 250m sprints. Maybe even a 2000m one and play bumper cars.

Perhaps 12 teams at first and have 2 heats of six?



The 250's would be cool.

Guess we will wait and see how much interest there is.

hehe, 250's are fun!

i think you guys still need some sort of officiating, you need a starter and some sort of video/timer at the end. perhaps you can approach an organizer with the idea.

anyway, the way sizzler works is two teams go head to head, and they race back to back (with 5-10mins of rest in between), and switching lanes in the second race.

total times for both race is used to rank the teams, i'm not sure how the rest works. i'm sure points are awarded for winning too.

here's the website.. it's crap though, east coast dragonboaters haven't learned to use computers yet...

http://www.dragon-boat.com/Summer%20Sizzler/sizzlerregistration.htm

There is something in the works out of FCRCC.  They are organizing a league where you get points everytime you race.  It will be head to head competition, once a month.  At the end of the season there will be a by invitation only (i.e. top 8 teams, based on points, of the league and the winners of Alcan, FCRCC Regatta, Victoria and Kelowna, so 12 teams) for a championship race off to crown the Top Team of False Creek.

Anybody interested?

Anything more on this?  Sounds fun.

what about a great water naval battle each month?  and the dryest teams get awarded the most points :D

hehe. just a thought.

that would be fun but not in false creek

it would be nicer farther out, like near spanish banks.

That just makes the stakes that much higher  :twisted:

Off topic but....

IT'S YOU! Several times, our team had to use the boats you were in for our final races right after you and your team fills them up with water during your waterfights!

Another thing, does your team even realize what's in False Creek water? You should since you guys always get doused with it every year.  :shock:

Anyways, continue on...

HAHA LEAGUE! i love it.

ah yes. boats fill with water during final races.. not cool. >=P

Yeah, we know all about the dangerous levels of coliform at false creek :p  but after many waterfights, i think we've all become resistant to the water hahaha.

After our waterfights, we do make sure our boats are nicely bailed for the next team to use.

yeah, I think my immunity to crap has improved.. who needs flu shots?!

you Synergy guys always have the best waterfights... everyone at each festival loves watching them, except for the team that has to use that boat afterwads :)

My immunity to crap has improved too... *dipping bottle into the creek* "protein shake anyone?"

Anyways, back to topic, this league idea sounds good... it'll motivate people to come out to their weekday practices at the very least. But I'm guessing that participating teams would all have to schedule their practice slots for the same time, same day? Easier said than done... trying to make all 25 people happy on a single team is hard enough :(

The King of the Creek thing sounds pretty cool! That would be a nice wrap-up event to the season too!

If the competition is going to be once a month, why not hold different heats throughout the month on each night with each team racing once during a month on their regular practice night.  More work for the organizers though.

Every couple of months have a Saturday morning or Sunday morning event where teams that don't practice on the same nights can race each other.

Idea - people who volunteer to help set up for each set of races get a bonus point for their team??

what about the Fall/SPring classics at DZ?

I know this is kind of an old thread... but it is the beginning of a new season....

I was talking with some people at FCRCC and DZ and they have indicated something is coming soon.  They indicated it looks like a go for this year.

So.. Tigger... it's now almost Alcan time... any news on this?

can't speak for the rest of my team, but this sounds interesting.  any news?

Chaotic,

Sad to say but everything was progressing well until some of the FCRCC people got severe burnout.  So that means no series unless they get more help.

I would suggest teams/people that want this to happen, send an email to FCRCC and DZ coordinators as the two groups were working together to get this to happen.

It is not too late as the the details are done, just no bodies to pull it off.

If you want this to happen then send email to [email protected] and to Jackie at DZ.

The sooner it gets done the faster we can get something to happen.

Tig

I guess it's time to bring up this topic again...

How many bodies is needed for this?
There shouldn't be that many needed is there?

Bare minimum... Two (starter/driver) on the startline in a coachboat. They can be race referees after the start.  One person at the finishline with the ADBF finishline software/setup. They would be able to communicate between the two points with an FRS. Teams should know how to load into a boat (they do it all the time during practices), but I guess you could have one person there.

For the boats we could use DragonZone's Gemini's on a Sunday afternoon or something since no team practice in the afternoon.

Chaos,

Send an email to the orgainzers of the regattas in FC and see what is required.  Mind you this would be smaller but I do remember hearing that there is more than just setting up a race course.

It is something I have been looking forward to but the league does not look like it will happen this year :x

I was thinking something like what we had for when I was playing ice hockey... have a round robin between the teams.. head to head... award points accordingly. once round robin is done, do a single elimination tournament. if there's an odd number of teams for the tournament eliminate the bottom teams till you get a proper single elimination.

Since races are so short anyways... teams can just show up, do a quick warm-up, race and then leave... Round robin races shouldn't take too long.

If I can get at least 6 teams interested in doing this, I wouldn't mind putting some of my resources towards this little endeavour. Of course this won't mean that it'll actually get off the ground.

Of course we could always get at least 120 committed paddlers, six steerspeople, six drummers and have a draft at the beginning...