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Dragon Boat Canada


IDBF


Canoe Kayak Canada

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[Martini]

Hi all,

You are all probably wondering what is happening with dragon boating this season. You are probably also very frustrated by the fact that practices have yet to start and there have been no announcements.  The purpose of this email is to let you know that people are working hard to try to get practices started, and also towards holding a regatta in August.

For those of you who don't know me, I have been a paddler in Calgary for approximately 8 years and am currently with the Dragnum crew.

First some background.  As most of you know, dragon boating has been in a bit of a mess since the previous operator and the City of Calgary parted ways three seasons ago. Recognizing this fact, the City hired an independent consulting firm to establish a sustainable organization to run dragon boating in Calgary. The focus of this not for profit organization, is to promote the sport of dragon boating in the City and to hold an annual festival.  A call was put out for volunteer board members, and from those who responded a founding board of directors has been appointed. Future boards will be elected annually by members of the society, which will hopefully be all of you.

The founding board consists of Kelvin Koay, from Crew Yahoo, and myself, as representatives of the paddling community, as well as 5 other members from the business community in Calgary. The board was formed May 18th.  Since that time we have been working very hard to try to get practices started. Formation of this new organization was a fundamental requirement to securing City approval for use of the reservoir for this and subsequent seasons. There remain a number of financial, organizational and regulatory matters to be addressed before dragon boating activities can be confirmed. The Board plans to make a formal announcement within the next 7 to 14 days on what will be taking place this summer.

As a paddler, I know how frustrated you all are. I share this frustration, and believe me if there was any way we could get the boats on the water sooner it would have been done. Be assured that there is a lot of work going on to get the boats on the water and hopefully we will have an announcement soon.  It is my sincere hope that with the formation of this new group, and the work that is being done, that this will be the last spring that the dragon boat community will have to face this uncertainty.

Stay tuned,
Shane Martin

[NFW]

Good job stepping up Shane!
Hope the db season in Calgary can be salvaged!

btw, is Dragnum coming to SF again this year? 

[Martini]

Thanks NFW - hopefully we can get things running properly again here.

No SanFran for us this year, we are headed to GWN in Toronto, its also a great festival with tough competition. It would be nice to start practicing! Yeah, I know you've been paddling since February . You headed back to SanFran? I heard its sold out already.

[NFW]

Yep we are heading to SF this year, we're trying to accomplish what we almost did last year...hopefully we can take it all this time around. 
I've heard the competition is excellent in TO as well, so it should be a great event for you guys!

haha, we actually havent stopped paddling since last season save for 1-2 weeks in december. The beauty of vancouver "winter" if you can call it that lol

[Martini]

No, you can't call it winter. I lived out there for 10 years, its a "mild spring" by Calgary standards.