The Victoria Dragon Boat Festival has always brought back fond memories for me… there’s nothing like PKing in the middle of a busy street because one of your sandals breaks on you… even more memorable would be limping into a tourist shop to ask for duct tape so you could tape what’s left of your sandal to your feet so you could paddle in the upcoming heat. But that was 2002.. this is now 2003.
For this year’s Victoria Festival, I traveled with my friend from Fresh Off the Dragon Boat (aka SteamRollers) but paddled for our friends from Portland, Multnomah.
The festival was pretty much like it was last year. The race is 500m in the Inner Harbour racing towards the Empress Hotel and Parliament Building. Racer’s Village was in the same Army tents, with the same pre-marshalling area where you would be lead to the marshalling area by the docks. Like all Foundation 2000plus festivals, the Millennium boats were used. As a paddler that uses leg drive, I personally prefer these boats to the 6-16’s since you can place your outside leg in a more comfortable position.
Even though it was stated that carbon-fibre paddles were not permitted, I did see a couple of them used in the water during the races. One paddler was caught with one and the festival staff actually held the races while they replaced the carbon-fibre paddle with on the festival ones.
Onto the races…
www.roli.com had a strong first day and a decent second day and finished a respectable 9th overall out of 80 teams.
Fresh Off the Dragon Boat won Diamond Division decisively with a 4 second margin over the second place team, Team Storm. They definitely proved that their Alcan result was not a fluke. These guys will be the ones that every other "CBC" team will have in their target sights aiming for. I expect another strong finish for them in Kelowna. And to the Freshies on the board.. don't let all this praise inflate your egos...
Swordfish had a pretty good run as well, placing in the Diamond Division. I expect good things from these guys next year.
Multnomah ended up finishing third in the Bronze Division. The Bronze final was definitely an interesting race to be in… since it was actually two races. In the first race, Dieselfish (lane 4) lost control of their boat and cut off Multnomah (lane 5) bad enough to force Multnomah to hold the boat, causing us to finish last. This resulted in the officials calling for a re-race. While lining up for the re-race we had to wait for the Coho to go by. For those that aren’t familiar with the Coho, it is a car ferry that docks on the opposite side of where the dragon boats dock. So after sitting in the hot sun for an extra 5-10 minutes, the race finally gets under way. Shibumi (the VO2 that went down to Portland should recognize that name) comes in first… Dieselfish (an actual conglomeration of Dieselfish and GungHaggis) comes in second.. and Multnomah in third…
So the big question is… would it be worthwhile to go next year? If the cost of the ferry is ok with you then definitely go. The weather’s been great every time I’ve gone over... you can do some sightseeing since it’s so close to the race site. Keep in mind that the race site can only facilitate 80 teams so if you are interested in going next year, I recommend registering as early as possible. I know first hand that there were numerous teams that were stuck on the waiting list hoping to get in.
