The Paddlefish trekked to Cherry Hill NJ for the Cooper River Dragon Boat Festival on Sunday, July 16th. The weather warnings seemed ominous but we were hoping our river karma held us in good stead. We were wrong!! Although we did not have the predicted thunderstorms, the rain was pretty intense. The hosts and 22 Dragons did an heroic job of moving the races through quickly. The 500 meter exhibition, to our relief, was cancelled. Phew!!

We were satisfied with our performance and put down some good times. We were not a match for the A group who all raced a sub one minute 200 meter race. DCH was a machine. We came in third in our group but improved our times with every race. In order: 1:02.750, 1:01.980, and 1:00.820. The fabulous steer, Evan, gave us some pointers which helped our performance and we are diligently working on improving our starts.

A few pictures will give you an idea of the shoe sucking mud that plagued us but did not dampen our spirits. It was great seeing Sophie Jan. Thanks to Darlene, Peggy, and Diane for filling our two empty benches. And thanks to Chuck for being the ever ready videographer even in the downpours.

There are no pictures of Coach Laurie who paddled with Hearts of Steel and our team. She was totally drenched the entire day. Many thanks Laurie for preparing us!!

Our team dinner was its usual lively affair.

What makes or breaks a team….GRIT. And we got it!! GO PADDLEFISH.