Coulee Classic Dragons kick-off Dragon Boat season
Following a long winter of training and the excitement of the 2018 Pan Pacific Masters Games, Southern Alberta’s eminent women’s dragon boat team is in Vancouver for the first regatta of the season this weekend.
The Coulee Classic Dragons, a 50+ paddling team, will compete at the False Creek Women’s Dragon Boat Regatta, the first of two qualifying events required to achieve the team’s goal of participating in the Canadian National Dragon Boat Championships in Regina this July.
In 2016, paddlers seeking to compete at a higher level came together from various southern Alberta teams to form the Coulee Classic Dragons. The following year they travelled to New Zealand for their first World Masters Game experience.
The team member’s individual dedication to months of training, plus support from the University of Lethbridge sport training facility and aquatic centre teams, YWCA fitness centre trainers and exercise physiologist Lori ChakiFarrington, assured CCD was competition-ready for the 2018 World Masters Games in Queensland, Australia last November.
The Coulee Classic Dragons will be among the anticipated 65 teams participating in the qualifying events at the ATB Financial Lethbridge Rotary Dragon Boat Festival June 21-23 at Henderson Lake.