Last week four members of the Kempsey Macleay Dragon Boat Club made the long journey across to Adelaide, South Australia to compete as part of the Northern Region State Crew at the Australian Dragon Boat Championships. Bryan Beard, Chereyll Beard, Sam Fowler and Belinda Fowler were selected some months ago from paddlers applying across the region, and they have been training hard to be ready. The Rats have been training with their own club at least three times a week, both on the water and off, and then traveling to Taree each Sunday to train with the select crew under the expert guidance of State Coach Joe Iacono.
The experience has been really amazing for the group, the expectation on performance and the level of training is so much more than you would normally experience at a local club level. It's been hard work but it's really paid off! The crew were triumphant in every race entered in the State-v-State battle;
2nd: 500mtr Mixed 20's 2nd: 500mtr Womens 10's 3rd: 500mtr Open 10's 2nd: 1km Team Pursuit We are now looking forward to a series of local regattas, starting with Urunga on 1st May, the next really big interstate event some of us are headed off to is the Coast to Coast Dragon Boat Festival held at Kawana in Queensland at the end of May. We have a really full schedule of racing again this year, which is great as like so many other sports ours has been pretty much on hold due to COVID. Almost every month from now on there is a regatta! It's so exciting to finally race properly again!
We are always on the hunt for new paddlers to join us too, so if you're keen, get in touch! We would love to have you in the boat! You can find us on Facebook and Instagram, and check out our website for more information www.kmdbc.org
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