Dragon Boat West

Tuna,
did you guys end up going?

nope, but ive been getting some funky-ass pictures from my friends.

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Whelp, another Kelowna Festival has come and gone, marking the end of the dragonboat season for a large majority of the Vancouver teams.

My first thought when I arrived into Kelowna was probably the first thought on a large number of paddlers travelling to Kelowna. "I don't see any smoke... must be a good sign"
Weatherwise it was pretty good... except for Sunday morning where it rained... and showered... and dumped...

First of all, congratulations to Alpha Dragons Red, Pacific Reach and Team Storm for coming 1, 2 and 3 overall in this year's festival

Fresh Off the Dragonboat came in 6th in the Platinum Division, beating out teams like DWW and Acme Dragons and nearly beating www.roli.com. Word of advice to the the guys on the boat.  When you are planning to dunk your girls, make sure they don't hear you planning it... they'll usually run away after they get off the boat once they know about it.  Oh and... you're supposed to throw people in the water... not drag them through the gravel...

MPower came a respectable 5th place (12th overall) in the Platinum Consolation.  Considering what happened to some of their paddlers I am impressed that they were able to keep their times consistent.  I hope you guys are ok and best of luck to you guys next season.

Congratulations to Eye of the Dragon for winning the Gold in the Diamond Division (15th overall). You guys along with the Grand Dragons are definately an inspiration to us all.

VO2Max ended up finishing 3rd in the Gold Consolation, edged out of a Gold Final berth by something like three-tenths of a second by VanCity Thunder who eventually took the Gold division beating out BC Hydro.

The races were marshalled pretty efficiently at some times heats were going one hour ahead of schedule.  Of course once the boats were on the water, it was a different story.  I have never seen so many collisions and near collisions *cough* Linguini *cough*
It may be because the race course does not run parallel to the shore but actually at an angle.  Also I overheard that lanes 1 and 2 were very disadvantaged lanes since there's a strange current that runs down those lanes that would slow down boats in those lanes (and you thought stories about Ogopogo were stange).

The paddler's party was held in the beer garden again this year.  I didn't go in but from what I heard, it was pretty packed as usual.  Biggest complaint was that it got pretty dusty since people were kicking up sand when they were dancing.

In general, Kelowna was well run and definately a favorite out here on the West Coast.  I definately would recommend teams to attending this race in the future.

On behalf of EOTD, thanks!  Luck was definitely on our side this past weekend.  We had some pretty decent draws for our heats.  

I was shocked that we made it in the Diamond finals.  If you guys were there Saturday afternoon, we had the most interesting second heat of the day.



First, it took about ten minutes to line the boats up.  Gorging Dragon was trying to jump the race ("referee's words").  Then about half a minute into the race, we collided with Gorging Dragons.  I don't know what really happened but heard that GD was trying to cut into our lane.  

We had to restart the race again.  This time, half way through the race, the boat to our left started to veer toward us and the referee stopped them.  I swear that I heard the referee calling for us to stop as well, half our boat stopped paddling.  Yet we somehow managed to pick things up and came in second behind GD.  It was a damn ugly race.



The party was packed and everyone did kick up a storm, but it was real fun.  It was especially fun for us when we noticed that a couple of the Capital Iron paddlers had passed out from drinking and had to be carried home.  We knew we were going to race them the next day.  Indeed, they did not have a full boat on Sunday.  msn(6)  



I second that.  It would be even more fun if they bring back the grape stomping.

I lost $3.25 at the Casino.  Hopefully better luck next year.   :D

I guess $3.25 is quite heafty for someone without a job  :lol:

how's the left arm??

Dood! you should change your name back to loudmouth!  :lol:


What's that about? :roll:

Back on topic, are there any video clips available of the collisions?

Is that what happened to Capital Iron when they raced with only 15 paddlers?

I did hear of one team that got a bunch of paddlers taken out of the boat.

They forgot to bring their i.d. bands with them.  :shock:

Poopy has the video of the collision for FODB's crashes in Race #2.  Quite interesting to watch.

video clips? post'em up! post'em up!!

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Post it up!

I thought Mission Hill was the worst wine-tasting experience I had that week.  The tour was really glitzy, but not much else.  Those that have an extra day next time they're by Kelowna really owe it to themselves to check out some smaller wineries down at Penticton and southward to Oliver.  Awesome wines, friendly people and an excellent way to get plastered (most don't charge you for the tasting, unlike Mission Hill) :D

From the festival organizers