Dragon Boat West

Platinum A

1st - Kai Ikaika  (1:52.29)
2nd - GD's (1:53.12)
3rd - GRPC Gunnell Vision (aka Dragonauts) (1:56.54)
4th - Absolut Adrenalin (1:57.43)
5th - Navy Dragon Anchors [1:58.05]

Platinum B

1st - Xtreme Reach (1.59.57)
2nd - Wasabi Premier Mixed (2:00.44)
3rd - Capital Iron Dragons (2:00.63)
4th - PI Dragons (2:01.16)
5th - Sweet & Sour Dragon Balls (2:02.29)

[Admin edit: Included poll]

There was some really close races in most divisions as the Victoria Organizers put up a decent race grid which resulted in some very close and exciting races for the racers and the audience. Although the platinum final was a 2 pony show with Kai and GD putting up some smoking numbers (1:52 & 1:53) it was a tight race for third with Absolut, Gunnel vision and Navy. Most races I saw were decided at the finish with most a 3 or more teams crossing the finish in the same second!.
Let me tell you there nothing like a roar of a crowd in the final 75 meters to get the adrenaline going in your system! AWESOME!
You feel like you can pull the frigging boat yourself! WHAT a rush!
A personal side note for yours truly was the Diamond final ,being between Swordfish, Alpha and Sudden impact (A repeat of the Harrison showdown if you may(minus the TD lightning) and Team Yahoo (from Calgary) and Hampton Woods. When it was all said and done The Fish kicked a$$ and took the Gold. Nuff said. Sudden Impact took Bronze while Team Yahoo captured Silver.
The other Vancouver teams that fared will were the Team Ultimate Dragonhearts and the Eye of the Storm.
Once again a first class event from the Victoria DB festival organizers with a smooth running on time schedule (Even with the COHO!)
Great Weather, Great racing and a chance to meet the Victoria members of DBW as well!
Pics to follow when I get back and sober up !

For all those teams that went, great racing.  If you won a medal, you earned them as the competition was great.  If you won a ribbon, congratulate yourself as you did a wonderful job and go buy a book as they make great bookmarks.

Victoria was one of those festivals that always has some competitive races but this year it was very good.  This year seeding was pretty good but there were a few seedings that may have been better but compared to last year it was leaps and bounds better.

Victoria is always a fun yet competitive festival, weather is always great, people are nice, location allows everyone to go off site to do other things (instead of sitting in a stuffy tent all day), lots of drinking water, fans are great yelling from the dock.  Generally the best run event for Foundation 2000 (or whatever they are called now).  They had a video camera (no web phone with video capabilities this time) for the finish and they needed it (Richmond are you listening, 3 visually impaired people doesn't cut it).  It would be nice to know exactly where the finish line is on both sides (but that holds true for every festival).  Overall, for racing it as well run as Alcan is (remember on the racing side  :wink: ).

One suggestion after watching all of the finals that I would have for them, look at the point and time system.  It works well for the first day but I am starting to think they need to have the semis decide which division a teams goes into.  If you looked at Diamond through Gold (total of 30 teams) most of the teams were within a second (maybe 2 seconds) but because of seeding etc on Saturday some teams were in a lower division (not that the racing was any less competitive though).  Everyone wants to end up in as high a division as possible so racing in a division and then have consistently as good or better times than divisions above you makes some teams fustrated.  So the only improvement that would be nice to see is to have the semis be split into something like Alcan where the semis decided what division you go (i.e. after Saturday have platinum semis there is usually a split where the top 10 teams are obivious, maybe diamond/jade/gold semis 30 teams in all, silver/bronze, and so on).  I would have to think about how to do it but just a thought.

See everyone in Kelowna, if the team I am on goes.

BTW did anyone notice that Victoria was not sold out, they only had 84 teams but they could handle 90 teams and they use to always sell out early.  So far this year I have not seen any festival sell out, Alcan was down, Richmond was down, Victoria was down, I am hearing Kelowna is down.  Me thinks we have reached the critical mass for too many festivals and too little money and weekends for everyone.  Organizers had better start budgetting for fewer teams at their festivals and plan accordingly (or lower their fees).

Full Race Results

http://www.victoriadragonboat.com/documents/vdbf%202005%20results.xls

Kind of strange they would put up the final results as a MS Excel File.

Update:  As expected they have changed to a PDF.  

It can be downloaded at:

http://www.victoriadragonboat.com/documents/2005finalresults.pdf

We can now place our teams in platinum division and have the fastest time.  What a great sovenir for a team.

 :lol:  :lol:  :lol:  :lol:  :lol:  :lol:  :lol:  :lol:

Don't going chaghing your medal yet. The trimes were fluctuating at times (tide ,Current?) If you check your teams times over all times against the other platinum teams that would be a better indicater than your last final race time.
 Anyways, If it was good time, then Congrats!

LW,

I just looked at the tide chart and the tide was pretty slack at 3PM (only 1 foot off of high tide) so tide was not a big factor for the upper divisions. That is one of the nice things about Victoria, tides are not huge there compared to Vancouver.  Wind was not a big factor this year, some years the wind really can assist a race when it kicks up.

Since most of the competitive racing occurred within an hour of each other (excluding platinum) I like looking at how teams performed over the entire weekend as that tells me who raced better.  Swordfish was pretty consistent in their times while others improved and some slowed down.

You won't have to worry LW about Swordfishy's gold we won't take it away from them (no protest from me  :shock: ), they earned it  :wink:

How the final times in the top division were as they should be. By that i mean the fastest Platnum B was still slower then the slowest in Platnum A. You dont see any faster times in a lower division until you get to Jade A where the top 3 teams would have been second only to Swordfish. There has to be a better system then this. Its all about the luck of the first draw. Unless your already one of the top teams if you draw a tough heat in the first race your screwed. You cant make it into the top 2 divs. Swordfish as deserving of the gold as they are had a good draw, took two wins and made it into Diamond. Swtich VO2 Max or even Masala with Swordfish in the first race and it seems to me you have seen Swordfish in Jade and VO2 Max in Diamond.

Anyhow I thought it was a great festival. The way they pre-marshall the teams and lead them down is very efficient. I dont think I ever waited more then 15min from pre-marshall to getting into the boat.

Hmmm If I read the race result clearly I notice that in the peliminary heats that Masala and VO2 max stime were not as fast as their final races and if they were the "seeded team in their heats then there times would not have reflected on their standings. True, I have a vested interest in Swordfish, but their times were consistently fast on Saturday (12th overall) which seeded them in the Diamond division. Its too bad that Masla and VO2 max did not have their best races Saturday but it gives you everyone soemthing to stride for next festival. I do not think SF is worthy of Jade either nor did I think Masala was even close to being "REC C team in Alcan ( They should have been much higher) but one bad race will cost even a good team. AS for team seeding in Victoria, I asked about that and why SF got a seed, it was because of past race performance this year, not by draw. Look at  the  lane 3 teams in the first day grid and see that most lane 3 teams were ranked teams.
I know last year it was a gong show for the Saturday Grid and it was apparant in the finals when the racing was not even close in many finals but check out the results this year and there were not many blow aways in the final. There were some better teams in lower divisions but a far cry from last year. Hey, Win more races earlier in the year, get ranked and kick more butt. SF has not been getting much respect this year (dogs, seals , ROLI paddlers..etc..) but I think they deserve a little bit eh? Thanks Tiger for letting them keep their medals too!

so thats how it works. Do well in previous festivals and get an easier road to the finals in future festivals.

Thanks ill remember that for next year.

rather than planning on having fewer teams, festivals now should be focussing more on quality rather than just quantity (not that they shouldn't have been before, but the quality festivals are where teams will go).  I wasn't at Richmond but i've certainly read and heard enough to know that compared to my experience at Victoria recently, which I have to say was the best festival i've attended to date, if I were ever forced to choose between the two Victoria would get my money.  More and more I think we're going to see that as teams will look at the price and think "where can we get the most bang for our buck"... I think even the might Alcan is going to be facing that harsh reality, if it hasn't already.  Giving the paddlers a quality experience is a MUST.

and let me give kudos one more time to the victoria organizers, if there are any on this forum... what a great festival.  And I echo the comments about having the bleachers at the finish line, OH MY GOD what a rush that is, especially as 3 of the 4 races I participated in came down to a less than a quarter of a second difference between 1st and 3rd and the way the crowd roars at a good finish... all i can say is wow.  Everything about this festival seemed intentional; there were no "accidents" leading to the success. and the volunteers were all awesome.  I didn't once come across a zombie who somehow got roped into it, they all seemed genuinly interested in the sport and in doing the best they could in their roles, especially the marshalling crews (extra kudos to Greg) and the dock crews... what a fine job

I definitely hope my team goes back next year, i think i can safely say we all were very impressed!

ABSOLUTELY FABULOUS FESTIVAL!!! There's an echo in here I realize, but how many times is too many to thank such a great bunch of people? Friendly, helpful volunteers; skilled, proactive organizers and officials who GET IT and focus on paddlers while making the event so exciting for spectators as well. Decent food court; minimal commercial 'strip mall' like at Alcan; good entertainment; very secure paddlers' village close to the action.

If there's a single negative it's got nothing to do with the festival society. It would be nice to see a little more courtesy from the water taxis and whale watching boats. they could have timed their departures or at least given racers a wider berth, rather than playing chicken with us and giving lanes 1 & 2 a big wake to tackle. But they're folks trying to make a living.

And hey - they didn't run out of beer! Lord knows I did my part to make it happen ...  :Cheers:

It was a fabulous festival.  Seeding or not, the extremely close final races demonstrate that the Victoria organisers have figured out something right.  Sure there might have been a few anomalies, but I don't think there were any upset paddlers.  I have to agree with an earlier post, the bleachers lining the last 100m of the course was awesome.  Alcan should take note.  I couldn't hear the other boats, or even my drummer over the roar of the crowd that was cheering, for the most part, simply for witnessing great neck and neck racing.  The natural venue of the Inner Harbour adds to it as well.  Although the paddlers' village was kinda tight, limiting a comfortable warmup area, having the marshalling area right in the center with a nice, loud PA system made the coziness all worthwhile.  The crew marshalls (Greg was hilarious) were also excellent.  I loved being escorted down as a team to the race dock.  Remove the whale watching boats, water taxis, float planes and the Coho, and it would have been a perfect festival (even though it didn't slow things down that much....running a half an hour early on Sunday, incredible).  A thank you goes out all the paddlers, for the great competition and sportsmanship.

You got it!....I think....

Anyways ..getting back to the festival. It was an awesome festival and like everyone saying it is AWESOME having the crowd at the last 10 meters to the finish! if you think you have run out of gas for the finish the crowds noise and roars give all the paddlers in the race a HUGE a$$ rush!
I think for next year the festivals with the best bang and great racing for the buck will be Nanaimo (don't know it if you haven't gone yet (Vancouver teams!), Harrison (not bad for a first year event and can only get better) and Victoria. The jury is still out on Kelowna but I am sure it will be a great event.

i'd also like to add that the announcing was quite good and i loved the fact that they had play by play broadcasting in the paddlers village... sometimes while trying to rest or warm up it was nice to hear how other teams were doing in their races if we didn't get to watch for whatever reason

This was my first time attending the Victoria Festival. Definitley had a blast even though it wasn't with my own team. The stands to view the races were a great addition. AND the FREE FOOD in racers Village on sunday.. :-D made my day.

Our team (StrangeBrew) had an absoloute BLAST of a weekend....we won the spirit award of which we are so very proud!   Thought the Festival was well run and the Village Marshall always makes our day.

But where was the free food??  We bring so much probably didn't even notice?

Great weather, great people, great FUN...

Maybe the person who said there was "free food" was helping him/herself to yours? :-)

Come to think of it.. Yea, Snogard was RIGHT beside you guys. I was wondering who's food that was .. ;)

The marshalling guy kept making announcements about seeing him for food. Where were you guys? Pork Buns , Honey Buns (ooh yes), Chips, pop.. all sorts of stuff.

Or was that another "Brew" team.. Who knows..

Sorry, Lethal Weapon.  Hampton Woods wasn't in the Diamond Finals.  They were in the Diamond B Finals.  The team you raced was the Portland Fire Dragons.  Like Hampton from Portland but a completely different team.

I love the VDBF.  It's the best race in the West.

Thanks for the correction!

Either way it was one of many extremely close races...On to Kelowna!