8 April 2018: Samsung 61st Festival of Sports - Dragon Boat Race
 

The inaugural race of every Navy season, the Samsung 61st Festival of Sports Dragon Boat Race in Sha Tin is our first chance to unleash some adrenalin from a long winter of training. Shing Mun River is the least picturesque venue on the Navy race calendar and is usually accompanied by grey skies and windy conditions. This year we were treated to a beautiful sunny day and an afternoon start. With flat water, even the river started to look ok.

POFC Covan secured our riverside HQ and once the team had assembled, a brief prep talk got our heads in the boat. The organisers changed the race format to a questionably short 100m, resulting in some insane ratings and compact race pieces. The team observed a few races to get an idea of the start procedure and the likely race plan. The competition was fierce with the firemen, HK national team and a duo of Mushu boats. The task ahead of us began to sink in!

Being the first race of the season, Sha Tin is a great opportunity for rookies to gain race experience and with this in mind, we fielded a team largely made up of apprentice sailors. We had a lot of fresh blood in our ranks, eager to get racing.

First up, lane 3 in Heat 5 of the Open Championships. Preparations commenced with Sailor Paul leading the warm up. POFC Joe talked the team through our race plan and off we jogged to the holding area. After the customary extended wait, we loaded the boat and paddled out to practice a start piece. With a pontoon at the start and our own steer, the lineup was a breeze. The teams were called out and BANG, off we went. Over the race distance, we managed our start piece plus around 8 strokes. Our time of 31:424s put us in 3rd place, missing out on automatic qualification for the semis by a frustrating 0.033s. Feedback from the steer and the video of the race told us our timing was off and generally the boat had a lot of power but it was a mess. A lot to think about for the next race.

After a debrief and checking the results, we suddenly realised we had 30 minutes until our next race. Before we’d even had time to grab a snack and eye up a tepid Singha, we were warming up again. The aim for Repechage B, 1st or 2nd place to springboard us into a final. Running to the start, we only just registered on time and were far from composed. The other teams were lined up as we paddled out. The start felt better but the high rating and instability of the small boats resulted in a somewhat messy race once again. P4 with a time of 31.644s meant our day of racing was over. It was time to debrief and reflect on what could have been.

It was a day of firsts on many fronts. We had a lot of rookies on board, it was the first race for the strokes up front and for the guys coordinating the team. The 100m race distance, was new for the Navy too. Given the inexperience we carried, we did ok. A positive thing to take away from the paddling was that we have a lot of capacity to improve! We may only have had a minute of racing but it was great experience for the team and a fun day. The only thing left to do was to drown our sorrows with a warm beer and watch the final, won by the firemen in a blistering 26.799 seconds!


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