Twist, Rip and Glide....

It’s time to add another feather to my new-found activities cap, this time Dragon Boat racing. I hear you, it’s slightly unrelated to adventure racing as the chances an oversized 20 man raft being included in a race are pretty slim, but it is a waterborne activity.

I knew about Dragon Boat racing and had done my usual ‘I’d love to give that a go’ spiel. This was followed up with my usual ‘full of good ideas, lacking in action’ style. Hence I hadn’t quite gotten there.

The opportunity was recently provided to me courtesy of an old workplace and their decision to field a team in a Chinese New Year corporate dragon boat racing regatta at Southbank.

Team ‘Twist, Rip and Glide’, aka TRG, was born from a mottled crew of mixed males and female colleagues. We’d been bought together by our illustrious coach and team captain, Mark/the man with the big voice/‘Skins’, a lad who is unwaveringly passionate about his chosen sport.

The training
It all started off with 5 training sessions at the Brisbane River Dragons headquarters near Bulimba.

There is a certain technique required which translates to the power of your stroke. You need to twist over to get the paddle in to the water, then pull through by sitting upright, which in essence is all about your side core muscles and not arms.

With the technique down pat, the success of the team is all down to timing. A team should be paddling in perfect unison and this is achieved by watching a teammate diagonally in front of you and emulating their stroke. You don’t look at the water, you don’t look at your competition, and you certainly don’t check out a hot guy on the bank. You need to watch your teammate like a hawk, to a point where in any other circumstance it would be considered stalking.

There’s a system that is used whereby you start with 6 big powerful strokes, before ramping up the rate for 15 strokes to really get the boat moving, before settling in to slower powerful hits.

If the team is working well (aka in perfect unison whilst demonstrating a beautiful twist and rip), then you don’t need to paddle like the clappers. Some boats were only paddling at half the speed of other teams, yet were out in front. As Mark explained, a slower rate with a full buried blade, a big sit up and spot-on timing can bring home the trophy.

Off and racing!
The regatta was a lot of fun and proved to be a fantastic team building exercise. There was a lot of high-fiving, back patting and general fond words being shared throughout the day. Taryn was our official team photographer and we had a good cheer squad to back us up.

The races were 250m long (which is fairly short), and I can only relate them to a theme park ride. There seems to be a long lead up with stretches, waiting in the marshalling area, getting in to lifejackets and boats and sorting out the start line – a bit like standing in a slow moving line for the fastest roller coaster in the park. Then all of the sudden the starter horn blows, there is an explosion of paddles, noise and adrenalin, and the race is over and done with in a minute.

We competed in 4 races and came 2nd overall, only to be beaten by a (dragon) nose and around .5 of a second. The photo demonstrates how close the race was! It turns out we exceeded Captain Mark’s expectations, and probably our own.

I’m keen to keep on going with this sport. Aside from the usual physical benefits, it’s fun, being out on the water is enjoyable and it seems to be pretty social as well – which we all know I’m all for!

M