Dragonboat Extravaganza!

So a team mate of mine came through for me and let me steal some pictures her hubby took of the team and the boats. (Thank you Ann and Thierry!)
We started our day bright and early because our first race was at 9 a.m. Bleah!
Quite honestly I was to the point where I didn't care if we made it past the first race or not. I was tired from getting up early on Sundays, the practices were wearing me out and the novelty factor wore off about half way through.
The first race reminded me just how competitive I am. I guess not having competed in a competitive sport for a long time (I won't go into specifics here) I let the drive to win focus its energy in other areas.

There are several races over the course of the weekend. On the first day the first three finishing teams in a heat will continue to a second race. During the second races the top two finishing teams in a heat continue on etc.
Our first race was early in the morning and the water was nice and calm with the current in our favor. (fun fact about the river we are racing on; it changes directions about half way through the day)
A lot of us have never done this before so we are not entirely sure when we are actually going to start. Added bonus, the three of us in the front of the boat who are responsible for getting the paddling started are three of those people who have never done this before. It was a little nerve wracking but that dissipated quickly once we started paddling and the adrenaline took hold.
I'm not entirely sure where the other boats are around us. I can see the one next to us that is pulling ahead, but I can't see the others. Turns out this is because one never made it out of the gate and the other team apparently thought practice was unnecessary. They eventually finished, but it took them awhile.

We took second place in our first race. All the teams that qualify for a second race get a gigantic watermelon. (No I don't know why. Probably because they are in season and someone donated as ass load of them.) It was a delicious watermelon and I was highly disappointed that I didn't get a second piece because the whole thing had already been eaten.
It's now about 9:30 and our next race will be at 4:30. So we have several hours to kill. A bunch of us go out for brunch and end up back at the park where we just hang out and nap.



Up close and personal with a dragon boat face. I have no idea what it says on the teeth.
Note the festive bow.
Here we are waiting to get into a boat for our second race.

We are in the boat and heading for the start. The girl in the front on the head of the dragon is our flag catcher. When we get to the finish she has to grab the flag for us to officially be done. If she misses it we have to paddle the boat all the way past the flag buoy to be finished.
The guy standing up is our drummer. He shouldn't actually beat on the drum. He should just yell at us to get us to speed up or set pace. The drum is merely decorative.

This is the starting area. Four boats race at once. In this race we are in the furthest lane, which is lane 4. During the day the wind has picked up and clouds have moved in. The river has gotten a little choppy, so now we are going to be paddling against the current the wind and the chop. We have never done this before.
As soon as we get the boat moving we are hitting the waves and Mike and I (the two in the front seats) are drenched in short order. Please remember that this river water does not smell nice and we still haven't determined what type of nasty microbial things live in it. Angie maybe you could help us out with that. I'll send you a jar of water. So being covered in this water is not making the difficult work of paddling any easier.
I digress, this race is much closer than our first one. In this picture we are the boat farthest away. We aren't as far behind as it looks.

In the end we took third place by 1 second. Thus ended out dragon boat careers for this year.