Phantoms Win CDBF Bling!!! The Phantom Dragons / Pink Phantoms crew raced to a strong finish at the 2K16 Colorado Dragon Boat Festival. The crew performed well in every division, capturing 3rd Place in the 120-Meter Competitive Division, 2nd Place in the 500-Meter Recreational Division, and 1st Place in the 250-Meter Recreational Division. Congratulations Phantoms!
Additional photos and video clips shot at the event are posted here:
Phantom Dragons / Pink Phantoms – CDBF 2K16
On May 14, DRACO provided boats, equipment and technical assistance to help a group of East Grand Middle School students put on the Knight in Shining Armor Dragon Boat Race on Grand Lake, a fund-raiser to benefit the Shining Stars Foundation. The event was this year’s effort by a Middle School class that does a service project each year to raise funds for a worthwhile cause. In spite of “iffy” weather, the event was a great success, and everyone had a wonderful time. Here’s an article in the local paper describing the event: Dragon Boat Races on Grand Lake
More photos can be seen here: Knight in Shining Armor Dragon Boat Races
Here’s a link to the Championship Race.
Finally, a wonderful “Thank You” from the EGMS Students
DRACO was honored to be a part of Lutheran Medical Center’s BCS Pink Hat Tea this year, an annual event for the benefit of newly diagnosed and long-term breast cancer survivors. It was fun to display one of our dragon boats inside the Arvada Center, and a great opportunity to gain visibility in the local BCS community.
We received a warm reception promoting our new Breast Cancer Survivor dragon boat program, and added over a dozen prospective BCS paddlers to our roster!
As part of its effort to promote its new Breast Cancer Survivor (BCS) Dragon Boat Program, DRACO will be participating in this year’s Pink Hat Tea on April 16, an event hosted by the Lutheran Medical Center for the benefit of newly diagnosed and long-term breast cancer survivors. The timing is great – the focus of this year’s event is on health, fitness, and the importance of staying active as part of recurrence prevention.
We plan to have a dragon boat on display, along with video and/or other promotional materials available. Please join us for this great event, and help support both our program and the local BCS community!
Design and construction of DRACO’s new, second-generation pool paddling simulator (Sinker) is complete, and winter practices have now resumed. Based on initial testing on January 30 and February 6, the new simulator is greatly improved over the first generation prototype! See video from her maiden voyage at First Practice Video.
Our New Simulator arrives at the Wheat Ridge Recreation Center
Phantom Dragons paddlers, ready for “Sinker’s” maiden voyage!
Paddles Up!
Michael J. Boyd, Captain and Head Coach of the local Phantom Dragons team, raced in the coveted right stroke position on Team USA’s Senior C Mixed crew in the 12th IDBF Dragon Boat World Championships, held in Welland, Ontario this August. For dragon boaters, this is the pinnacle event – the equivalent of what the Olympic Games represents for more conventional sports. Notably, Boyd is the first paddler from Colorado to try out for and be selected to race on a World Championship level dragon boat team. Needless to say, he considered this experience to be the event of a lifetime!
Michael J. Boyd / Team USA Senior C Mixed 2015
The Team USA Senior C crew paddled with determination and heart in the 2000-meter, 500-meter and 200-meter divisions, setting a National Record for their time in the 200 meter races. However, the combined time for their two fastest (of three) heats in that division left them a scant 0.22 seconds behind Germany in the race for third place – heartbreakingly close, but just off the podium and out of the medals.
Here is a video of their Final Race in the 200-Meter Division.
Senior C Mixed 200-Meter Finals
Also check out Mike’s interview with Richard Smith of Belief Sport TV that provided live online coverage of the event . . .
Michael J. Boyd Interview – IDBF World Dragon Boat Championships
Additional Photos are posted here:
2015 IDBF Dragon Boat World Championships
In less than two weeks, Michael Boyd, Captain and Head Coach of the local Phantom Dragons team, will be racing in the IDBF Dragon Boat World Championships in Welland, Ontario.
Those wanting to follow the racing action can do so at the following site:
If you’re in a position to contribute to this effort, see the documents linked to the image below:
Team Scorch (a combined Phantom Dragons / Florida crew) brought home some bling from this year’s Colorado Dragon Boat Festival.
The team received Gold medals and a 1st Place Certificate for the 250m Rec A Division. The team also placed 4th in the 500-meter Competitive Division, and posted the fastest time in the 1,000-Meter “Guts & Glory” race (but were forced inside by another boat, missing a buoy in that race, which was for “bragging rights only”).
Due to an improperly called start (which was protested), the crew was allowed to re-run the 125m Final (with some awesome help from their LBT friends, who ran alongside to help push them along). Even though the PD/Scorch crew had to run that race back-to-back, immediately after one of its 250-meter heats, they posted a faster time than any other team in the final heat.
It was a great weekend of racing and camaraderie. Congrats to all!
The Phantom Dragons were joined by four paddlers from the BlindStart program in the recent Arizona Dragon Boat Festival. It was honor to have them as part of our crew, and fun getting to know them a little better at our team dinner Saturday night.
Check out this great article and video by a local news station that was doing a feature on the BlindStart Paddlers. The Phantom Dragons were prominently featured in a good part of the video footage!
Congratulations to the Phantom Dragons for their strong showing in the Arizona Dragon Boat Festival held March 28-29, 2K15. Short-handed for the event (as usual), the Phantoms crew had some much appreciated help. Its Mixed Crew was far more “mixed” than most, with three countries and eight+ individual teams represented in its ranks.
Although the Phantom Dragons didn’t quite make it to the medal round this year, they did post a team best 500-meter time of 2:17. This year’s Arizona Festival was a very competitive event. Check out the full Race Results
Many thanks to everyone who raced w/ the Phantom Dragons. Special paddle salute to Kamini Jain and her RAP paddlers for helping fill out our crew, and for giving the Phantoms’ female paddlers a chance to race w/ them in the Womens Division (in which her two teams won silver and bronze medals in the Women’s B)! Also a shout out to the four Blindstart paddlers who added some incredible strength to our mix! Thanks, too, to the San Diego Dragon Boat Team members who raced w/ the Phantom Dragons in the 250s, and allowed Captain Bligh to run w/ their Masters crew. And lastly, paddle salute to Lady Di and Rho, who got to run the 1000m race w/ the Golden Dragons. Fun stuff!
Here is a few photo taken at the event (courtesy of Kwok de La Luna for those he shared on Facebook – more to come on his web site soon)!
