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DRAGON BOAT FESTIVAL 2009 - WESTERN CAPE
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Saturday: Results
Ladies 250m
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Mixed 1000m
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Sunday: Results
Ladies 500m
Open 500m
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Article written by Pam Newby for Wild News, a monthly newsletter in the Garden Route The major premier event on the South African Dragon Boating Calendar until this year has been the annual WCDBA International at the V&A Waterfront in Cape Town. With the increasing harbour traffic, the expansion of the marina complex and its occupation by large yachts, the Western Cape Dragon Boat Association decided this year to move the event to Club Elani on Misverstand Dam at Moorreesburg, Western Cape. Just an hours' drive from Cape Town, Misverstaand provided an excellent venue for safe, competitive racing. Lawns dotted with shady willow trees sweep gently to the waters edge; fresh water with no strong currents, no tidal range playing havoc with the buoys, and no busy motor traffic to contend with meant the focus could be on uninterrupted racing. There are cottages for hire and for those who would prefer to camp, there was ample space to pitch tents. The new main venue-hall and bar was only finished the evening before the event, apparently with the whole local community pitching in to help - not entirely an altruistic gesture as it will be providing a very pleasant community centre for the farming community when there are no events. A lot of thought has obviously been put into its design and we were all most impressed with how the kitchen managed to get over 250 steaks at our closing dinner to be medium, rare or well done and hot and delicious all at the same time. Back to the racing, what made this two-day event special was that we were all away from home, so nobody left to nip home to their own space after racing each day. Teams arrived on the Friday and socialised together, raced fiercely on the Saturday and got together again in the evening before more fierce racing on the Sunday. Dragon boating in the Cape has grown from 3 clubs in 2004 to 10 premier and 5 junior clubs in 2009. Although we held a Juniors Regatta at the V&A Waterfront in February, the German School team opted to participate in the Premier event .. and stunned the Paddlesnappers, South Africa's oldest club, by beating them in the 500m mixed open. They also got gold in all the ladies events, well done kids! Other special competitors in the regatta were the amaBele Belles, Africa's first breast cancer survivor team. At present they are the only such team in Africa, so the ladies compete against the Premier teams and have a load of fun doing so. The Belles are hoping other BCS teams will make the journey to South Africa to race against them next year. Mujaji always gets given a little extra time to embark as one of our most committed, determined paddlers is Heidi Vollmer. Heidi broke her back 18 years ago and is paraplegic. She uses a supportive paddling chair made by Shonaquip of Cape Town. Her two silver medals from the event are a very precious symbol to her that she is "just another paddler" and an integral part of our ladies team. In one of our Mitchell's Plains team there are youngsters who used to take drugs but now that they are part of a team, it has got them away from the gang-and-drug culture so prevalent on the Cape Flats. It is gratifying to hear the team manager say they have been off drugs ever since they started paddling. Even our boats are special because they were built by the Whisper Boat Building Academy for deaf black youngsters in Khayelitsha. The Western Cape Dragon Boat Association's Dragon Boat Nationals this year were a trial run for an International to be held at the same venue in 2010 from the 19th - 22nd March. The concensus of all who participated was that it was a great success and we look forward to welcoming overseas teams next year. Click here for an event video 5.9 Mb |
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