Dragons are the rulers of the water, the rivers and the seas. For more than 2,500 years dragon boats have raced along China’s Yangtze River and steadily gained popularity around the world.
Twenty-six years ago, Ken Gene, a former competitive sprint paddler, started a dragon boat team in Stratford. Still president of the Stratford Dragon Boat Club, and the team is still sponsored by Gene’s Restaurant (his family’s restaurant).
Today, the Stratford Women’s Dragon Boat Team is one of the longest running dragon boat teams in North America. Along with the incredible exercise, the comraderie of the team is one of its most sustaining attributes, according to team captain Ruth Lacey.
Lacey joined the team twelve years ago when, upon signing up her children for the Junior Team, she inquired about the adult team for herself. The immersion into Stratford’s beautiful nature was an immediate and powerful allure.
“I love getting back to nature. When I’m on the water, it fills me up with a positive attitude,” says Lacey. Even more than the Zen energy of paddling the Avon River, is her adrenaline rush when racing, and “that feeling of floating on the water even though you’re working your butt off.”
The club’s boats hit the river about the same time as the city’s swans, and those first few early evening paddles during the week and early morning paddles on Saturdays begin with snow. The team paddles slowly, for short distances and short sessions, until tolerance and endurance are conditioned. As the season progresses throughout the summer, dragon boat teammates become warriors, pulling water with ferocity.
However, according to Lacey, it’s less about brute force and more about technique. The most important component is synchronicity. Everyone’s paddles must enter and exit the water at the same time. That is the focus of their training. Still, it is a full body workout that engages the core and latissimus dorsi muscles. In order to make sure that no one becomes lopsided, paddlers switch from one side to the other during practice. After each one-hour practice, arms feel like noodles, but paddlers are all smiles.
The women's team consists of 20 paddlers of every generation, ranging from 16-year-olds who paddle alongside those in their 70s - creating an appeal to families as well. They're always recruiting new members.
Onlookers, awestruck by the battalion's rhythmic propulsion through the water like a well-oiled machine, are inspired to support or join the team through the women's team Facebook page.
The team is run by the Stratford Rotary Club and raises money for charity each year. This year, the charitable cause is a Rotary Hospice in Woodstock, and they’re currently running an ongoing bottle drive to help fund new gear.
The Dragon Boat season includes five regattas held in St. Marys (Wildwood), London, Hamilton and Stratford. The Junior Team, Silver Masters Team, and the Women’s Team all compete in multiple disciplines – the 500m race course starts between the Waterloo Street bridge and Tom Patterson Theatre, and finishes just past Front Street before Tom Patterson Island. Of those, Lacey favours the 2km race.
“You just get going and you kind of turn into a machine, just moving and moving and moving,” she said.
The season reaches its climax when Stratford welcomes other clubs to their home turf for the annual Rotary Dragon Boat Festival, this year scheduled for September 14. The top four teams compete in the 2km, and last year several members of the Stratford team advanced to compete in Hong Kong. There is live music, food vendors, and an atmosphere of palpable excitement.
For Lacey, the thrill and pride in representing Stratford comes from the simpatico and focus that each one of her dragon boat teammates share.
“Everybody’s working hard together. Everybody shares the same purpose, and it feels great,” she said.
