Dragon boat team, breast cancer survivors, places 3rd in world
An Akron-area competitive dragon boat racing team, completely made up of breast cancer survivors, placed third in the world in Florence, Italy.
The Dragon Dream Team finished first among United States contenders and third among 124 teams worldwide at the international competition.
Seconds separated the top five finishers and tenths of a second separated the top finishers.
The Dragon Dream Team USA Akron finished its final 500-meter race in 2 minutes, 21.69 seconds. The Can Survive team from New Zealand finished second with a time of 2:21.28. The Knot a Breast team from Hamilton, Ontario, won the event with a time of 2:20.33.
All teams had raced a total of four heats over a two-day period on July 7 and 8.
Though placing in the final race was an important achievement, winning was not the point of the competition, said Amy Synk, president of the Dragon Dream Team.
Synk is a breast cancer survivor of seven years after having a double mastectomy, reconstructive surgeries and chemotherapy and radiation treatments.
“Our winning is an absolutely extraordinary achievement, but it is the overcoming of a breast cancer diagnosis that is our true victory,” said Synk of Medina, a member of the team for four years. “Being fierce in the face of fear is the definition of the Dragon Dream Team.”
In fact, it was never announced publicly how the top five teams placed at the festival, said Synk. After the final race, paddlers take off their team jerseys and all put on the same shirt to participate in a flower ceremony to honor those who have died from breast cancer.
The Portage Lakes-based Dragon Dream Team sent two teams with 45 of its 83 members to Florence for the 2018 International Breast Cancer Paddlers’ Commission Dragon Boat Festival.
A record 4,000 paddlers representing every continent raced in the dragon boating event. Dragon boating is a 2,000-year-old Chinese practice that involves 20 teammates paddling a 40-foot dragon-shaped boat while a drummer sits in the back and plays a beat to keep the team in sync. Akron’s team formed in 2007, 11 years after the first all-breast cancer survivor dragon boat team began in the mid-1990s when researchers found that upper body exercise is beneficial to patients.
Team comes together
The Akron-area team practices three times a week.
The team has come so far from the first such international event it participated in 2010, when it finished near the bottom of nearly 80 teams, said Barb Fox of Randolph Township, co-team operations manager, a founding member of the team and 12-year-cancer survivor. In 2014, the team placed 39th out of 102 teams at the races in Sarasota, Fla.
“The team is about paddling together, the emotional strength you get from one another. It’s about the camaraderie,” Fox said. “It will help our outreach as we support each other in life after breast cancer.”
The team raises money and provides outreach through its Boatloads of Hope. The program gives local hospitals, doctors’ offices and cancer centers boxes for patients containing a pashmina shawl and a note from the team saying they represent more than 100 years of survivorship.
This year, 300 shawls have been distributed.
The team has many survivors but has also lost a member every year Synk has participated. One team member had to pull out of the Italy race recently because her cancer recurred. The team got its strength from her and dedicated its races to her, Synk said.
The team will host its sixth-annual Dragons on the Lake Dragon Boat Festival at the Portage Lakes State Park on July 28. More than 30 teams are expected for the races and a gala later in the evening. Both are the main team fundraisers. For more information, visit www.dragonsonthelake.com.
Triumphant return
When the first group of team members arrived at the Akron-Canton Airport at midnight Tuesday, they were surprised by other teammates and family members who made a pink oar arch for the paddlers to walk through.
Carolyn Bernstorf of Wadsworth Township couldn’t believe her teammates surprised them at midnight.
Bernstorf, a team member for nine years and 13-year cancer survivor, said she can hardly describe the feelings she had as she and her teammates finished their final race in Italy.
“It was absolutely something I’ll just never ever forget. I’m just still even now so emotional, and I had tears of happiness when the race was over and we were crying,” Bernstorf said.
Bernstorf said she knew the team was good and they had progressed a lot since Sarasota four years ago. But she and other team members thought they’d finish in the top 15.
But Bernstorf ’s husband, Allen, who has served as the team’s coach since 2014, had other goals. He just didn’t tell the team members so they wouldn’t feel pressured. (The team had two teams in Italy, with the “A” team being the more experienced or stronger paddlers.)
“My goal was top 10,” said Allen Bernstorf, a former soccer coach. “The only question in my mind was the level of competition we were going to meet.”
When he started coaching in 2014, it took awhile to convince the team members that they needed more endurance training. That training paid off.
He said he’s inspired by his athletes. The average age of his team is typically around 60. The oldest team member on Akron’s winning team was 81-year-old drummer Pat Donnelly of Akron. She also was the oldest U.S. participant.