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DB DRUM
From the Chair It is with great pleasure that I write to all of you fellow paddlers, officials and volunteers as the new Chair of Dragon Boats NSW. Those of you who were at the recent AGM will have heard a brief speech from me outlining what I consider to be our major objectives for the coming year. I will outline them here now for all of us... We will continue the task of finding a new HQ for dragon boating in this State. Your Board believe that we have the support of the Minister but the task remains an ongoing project that demands our constant attention. I’d like to remind all our members that this will be an HQ for all of us to share and where we intend to hold meetings, base our office staff and run training courses in addition to housing our fleet.
Personally, I believe this role to be a ‘see and be seen’ role. I was lucky enough to help with the ‘road shows’ we held earlier this year and I believe that the feedback from them was almost uniformly positive. Our objective will be to continue them on a regular basis throughout our State organisation. A sincere thank you to our outgoing Board member Mat and especially to President Trish Tinyow. I have been in awe of the way in which she has overseen our organisation for the past 4 years. I hope that I may be able to follow her example. Finally you can be sure that we will be looking for new talent to fill our current Board vacancies and we hope to have that talent in place as soon as practicable. Geoff Roberts DBNSW Chair From the Board The Dragon Boats NSW Board has been very busy in the lead-up to the annual general meeting, which was held on 8 October. A summary of board decisions includes approving –
Other matters handled by the Board include –
2016 Annual General Meeting The annual general meeting of DBNSW was held on 8 October at the Sydney International Tennis Centre. Forty of the sixty affiliated clubs attended. The meeting dealt with ten changes to the DBNSW Constitution. These changes included some general tidying up of clauses and changes to accommodate the Board choosing its Chair. These changes have been done in “marked-up” form and placed on the DBNSW website for members information. After a month on the website the “marked-up” copy will be removed a “clean” copy placed on the website. The meeting also adopted the 2015-16 Annual Report. The Finance Director also provided a verbal finance report indicating to the meeting that the audited reports were received only the previous evening. He indicated the report showed a surplus of around $16,000. It was agreed that the report would be distributed to clubs and members. This report is now on the DBNSW website. The other duty of the annual general meeting is to elect Directors. Two Directors, Tamsyn Glen and Giovanni Cercone, were approved by the meeting for a further two year term. Technical Officials Travel Expenses Policy The DBNSW board has recently approved and implemented a new Technical Official Travel Expenses Policy. The board hopes that this policy encourages NSW based officials to assist both DBNSW and clubs at their regattas across the state more often. In short the policy allows those appointed to officials positions by the regatta organisers may seek reimbursement for pre-approved travel and accommodation expenses. The policy can be found on the DBNSW website here. If you have any questions regarding the policy, please get in touch. COURSES AusDBF Level 1 Coaching Course (NEWCASTLE) The AusDBF Level 1 Coaching Course is aimed to prepare beginner coaches for club or community based activities. Coaches with a current level 1 accreditation are expected to complete this course upon expiry of their current accreditation. The course is split into two parts across the weekend with theory and practical components on both days. DATE: Saturday 26th November 2016 & Sunday 27th November 2016 VENUE: Water venue - Newcastle Rowing Club, 34 Tully St, Carrington NSW 2294 Class room venue – TBA COST: $338.00 per person REGISTER ONLINE HERE PRESENTER: Sylvia Wong Far Northern Region Clubs please note that a course based at Grafton will be announced shortly with another at Port Macquarie to follow in the new year. Greater Sydney Region Invitation: Bei Loon 8km Challenge Race Dear Fellow Paddlers, The Bei Loon Dragon Boat Club will be holding our annual 8km Challenge Race on beautiful Pittwater on Sydney’s Northern Beaches on Saturday afternoon 18 March 2017. We invite you to join us for this DBNSW Sanctioned event. Event details and documentation can be accessed on our website www.beiloon.com.au or via the DBNSW website Regatta Calendar. This is a great Race and Team Building activity which attracted 16 crews when last held, and is ideally placed between the State and Australian Championships. Our post-race activities will be held at the outstanding and nearby Pittwater RSL Club, where we will have guaranteed exclusive use of their large auditorium. As usual, all paddlers will be given a FREE $25 RSL Meal Voucher. Several hundred paddlers and supporters are expected to attend the post-race presentations and social activity. REQUEST: As crew numbers may have to be limited, an early submission of the Expression of Interest document would be most helpful for our planning purposes and will afford your Club with priority Entry allocation. Please register your interest by contacting me at ….. gwwebster@hotmail.com We hope you can join us. Photo; Different Strokes in a previous year Regards, George Webster Secretary, Bei Loon Dragon Boat Club 9905 2919 Dragon Sports Association (DSA) October is Breast Cancer Awareness month and provides an opportunity for us all to focus on breast cancer and its impact on those affected by the disease in our community. Breast cancer remains the most common cancer among Australian women (excluding non-melanoma skin cancer). Survival rates continue to improve in Australia with 89 out of every 100 women diagnosed with invasive breast cancer now surviving five or more years beyond diagnosis. It was discovered by Dr. Don McKenzie that dragon boat paddling is an ideal sport for breast cancer survivors. Being a sport that involved strenuous, repetitive upper body exercise which in turn helps reduce the effects of lymphedema. Not only that, it built general fitness and confidence. The camaraderie and social support network that comes with the sport were of great benefit also. Breast cancer is a disease that has touched the lives of many in some shape or form. It knows no boundaries and does not discriminate. As a show of our support to build awareness that breast cancer (and dragon boating!) can affect anyone from all walks of life, DSA members will be posting up photos which symbolise that whilst we are unique individuals, we are all one community. We invite all clubs and paddlers to join us in posting up a “paddle life” photo during the month of October. A photo of your paddle, together with an item which is characteristic of your life outside of paddling. Don’t forget to hashtag #paddlelife Credit to our friends in CYSM Sea Dragons in Melbourne who initiated the idea and of course will be getting involved also. Much thanks. Editor: Apologies to DSA for not getting this information out earlier but never too late to join in Southern Region ILLAWARRA DRAGON BOAT CLUB Illawarra Dragon Boat Club launched their new dragon boat at the Illawarra Rowing Centre on Saturday 24th September, 2016. The weather was perfect and we celebrated with well over 100 people including Lord Mayor Gordon Bradbery, MP Anna Watson, Paul Scully and representatives from McGrath Real Estate (our major sponsors). After a great deal of fundraising the club took delivery of their new dragon boat at the end of May and“Spirit of the Lake” has now been officially launched .She had a Traditional Chinese Buddhist Blessing by Reverends from the Nan Tien Temple, which included dotting the eyes and opening the 3rd eye as well as a Christian Blessing. Amongst the activities there were the Chinese Lion Dancers, entertainment by Chord-eaux, and Out of the Blue Singers. The Argentinean Drummers, Philippine Dancers, Cinnamon Twist Belly Dancers and an outstanding Aboriginal singer, Teliah Edwards who sang the Aboriginal anthem as well as a couple of other songs after the “Welcome to Country” ceremony made it all very enjoyable and multi cultural. The members of the club performed a demonstration paddle and salute. This was followed by a BBQ and Face Painting and everyone (over 12 years of age) who wished had a go at paddling. Altogether 3 boat loads of very enthusiastic paddlers took part. The Illawarra Dragon Boat Club is heavily involved in the Shellharbour Festival of Sport Dragon Boat Regatta, for the first time this year they ran the paddling side of the regatta. They trained the Corporate/Social teams and have been instrumental in attracting high school teams to the event. Over the past few years the club provided dragon boating as a school sport to numerous local schools. Two have gone on to compete at the Chinese New Year Regatta at Darling Harbour in Sydney and one to compete at the State titles. They have also provided a dragon boating based experience to other sporting organizations, and community groups, recently they ran a course for the WEA Each year they provide a ‘Dragon Boat Encounter’ as one of the activities during Seniors Week. If you would like any further information on dragon boating please contact Helen on 0403844880, Catherine on 0411 577 275 or Gabrielle on 0413488957 or look us up on: www.idbc.org.au or illawarradragonboaters@y7mail.com or 0417 066 945 Western Region Paddling Clinic in Western Region New friendships were forged, much was learnt and a lot of fun was had by paddlers from almost all the Western Region Clubs plus Albury/Wodonga and the Illawarra at Lake Burrendong, near Wellington, over the Long Weekend. Pinnacle Dragons Abreast, Orange welcomed the paddlers to Burrendong Sport and Recreation Camp for a weekend with Canadian Coach, Kamini Jain. The contrast in paddling conditions between Saturday and Sunday could hardly have been greater. Saturday saw rain threatening and strong winds with the sweeps struggling to keep the boats close – but not too close. Saturday evening many tales of dragon boat experiences were swapped as Warren from Forbes and the men took charge of the BBQ, others lit a huge bonfire nearby and those feeling the night chill, gathered round the log fire in doors Sunday, dawned bright and clear, the water so calm it was seeing double as paddlers were reflected in the water. Video critique of Saturdays efforts was invaluable to all and it was obvious during Sunday’s sessions everyone had taken heed of lessons learnt. WHAT DRAGON BOATERS DO WHEN GALES BLOW Monday 03rd Oct. The vagaries of the weather prevented some from attending Kamini’s sessions planned for Lake Canobolas - but all was not lost. It was moved to home of George and Pearl. With aid of video, Kamini highlighted and explained some points on technique and followed up with everyone trying out a few exercises aimed at developing flexibility and developing core strength. Mudgee Mudlark, Julie declared her journey all way from Hargraves well worth it and along with Jo from Colour City and the Pinnacle Dragons were keen to get on the water and put into practice the theory. Have to say the older members present looked on with envy as the younger generation from James Sheahan School team seemed to be able to bend their bodies every which way. Northern Region After Dragon boating for nearly 4 years and representing NSW in the "Zodiacs" Travis O'Connor is getting ready to make the most of his chance to represent Australia in the "Auroras" Australian Under 18 squad. For his hard work his club nominated him for a local award and he was awarded The Daily Examiner Junior Sports Star of the Month for September. At the end of the year a Junior Sports Person of the Year will be named. Travis will have to travel to Canberra for an intensive 4 day training camp later this month before the final 22 are selected for the team. DBNSW congratulates you Travis and wishes you luck in your selection trials. KEMPSEY MACLEAY DRAGON BOAT CLUB The Kempsey Macleay Dragon Boat club marked the end of an era this month with the retirement of two founding members from the committee. Deirdre Forshaw has been the driving force behind starting dragon boating on the Macleay after watching the PanPacs regatta on the Gold Coast. She drove the process of starting as club, from incorporation, boat acquisition, to advertising and organisation, and we are so glad she did. Deirdre has been president and our "Mum" for the last 8 years, keeping the club running smoothly, booking accommodation, organising us and cooking us gourmet food amongst the myriad other things she does to keep the River Rats on track. She has left some very large shoes to fill. We hope Dee will still be keen to cook some of her famous fundraising breakfasts, and she is helping organise this year’s regatta. Mark Bradney has also been on committee since the beginning of our club. He served as treasurer for 6 years but his forte has been his coaching. He brought ideas and skills from other sports, spent innumerable hours thinking of new and different ways to torture --umm train us, and has devoted himself to turning our group of disorganised, unfit paddlers into the Rat Machine. The results speak for themselves, with success in local, national and international regattas. Mark has helped us "bring home the cheese". He has since passed the coaching to Anna Kirk and Chereyll Beard, who are keen to keep The Rats on target for more regatta success. Mark is looking forward to enjoying his paddling without the stress. Mark and Dee were honoured at the AGM by being awarded the first life memberships of the Kempsey Macleay Dragon Boat Club. Congratulations to Volunteer of the Month Harold Dulay (Pendragons) DBNSW Website DBNSW Facebook DBNSW Twitter Note to readers: Although care is taken to give correct and accurate information, DBNSW is aware that articles sent in by clubs may contain inaccurate facts. Unless the information is inflammatory it is not the intention of the editor to change or correct the information. Any views or opinions presented in these articles are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of DBNSW. Copyright © 2016 Dragon Boats NSW All rights reserved. Please send Contributions to Editor: office@dbnsw.org.au or editordbdrum@gmail.com Postal Address: PO Box 3162 North Strathfield NSW 2137 Phone: 02 8736 1283 unsubscribe from this list update subscription preferences  China Bound
Three young members of the Manning River Dragon Boat Club have reached the top level of their sport, being selected to represent their country in the Australian Dragon Boat Team, The Aurora’s. Alistair Adamson, Sean Page and Jade Page will travel to China in August next year to represent Australia at the International Dragon Boat Federation World Championships, with Alistair and Sean in the Under 18s crews and Jade in the Under 16s crews. Their families and club are extremely proud, with their selection being testament to their work ethic and dedication to their sport. Their success comes following an intensive selection camp at the AIS over the October long weekend. To reach this level, junior paddlers from across Australia had to undergo fitness testing, with the best from each state being selected to attend the camp. There they had a full schedule of fitness testing, assessment of individual techniques, and paddling in crews with others competing for selection to assess their ability to come together as a team. The weekend in Canberra was wet and extremely cold paddling on Lake Burley Griffin, adding another challenge to the selection process. In preparation for the camp, Alistair, Sean and Jade travelled to Sydney for coaching with Australian Under 16s coach, Mary Weaver. Mary was very impressed and reported that the Manning juniors performed particularly strongly during the selection camp. For Sean, this is his second time in The Aurora’s having been part of the gold medal winning Under16s team at the previous World Championships in Canada in 2015, whilst Alistair has been successful in the NSW junior state team winning gold at the past two Australian Championships. At just 12, Jade is the youngest member of the Under 16s crew but has already made a strong impression, edging out older paddlers in the selection process. They now start an even more rigorous fitness and paddling program as well as travelling regularly to Sydney, Brisbane and Canberra for training over the next year with the hope of bringing back gold from China. While the Manning club is excited by this news it has come at a very sad time with the passing of a much loved member, Gaye Mac Donald. Gaye was one of the inaugural members of the club, very supportive of the club and a great ambassador for the sport. Paddlers travelled from Nambucca, Port ,Macquarie, Camden Haven and Great Lakes to pay respect at the funeral last week. During recent training sessions a memorial paddle was undertaken to pay respect to a much loved paddler. Hi
Our regional juniors excelled again yesterday, with the Manning paddlers being key to the success. Firstly, they paddled with Sandy Point in the open juniors. Unfortunately they were the only open team, so they raced as practice for CNY, where there will be lots of teams competing in this category. In the mixed juniors, our regional paddlers combined with some Sydney Zodiacs paddlers and they looked amazing. In both heats they came in second to the Sydney Zodiacs and they improved with each race. In the final they were actually in front for most of the race, but were passed in the last 50m by Sydney Zodiacs. This was an amazing result as they haven't paddled as a team before and beat teams that regularly train together. So they have returned with a silver medal and another nice trophy to add to the cabinet. They also had a great time catching up with the many juniors from Sydney clubs. They have made so many great friendships In summary - it was a great weekend! Sue Hi
I just wanted to let you know that the juniors are travelling to Penrith this weekend to paddle at the NSW State Championships. We are paddling in two categories being:
In addition, Sandy Point have invited us to join them for a training session on Saturday, as we will be paddling with them again at CNY and hopefully at the Aus Champs in Adelaide. While we are paddling as Waratahs at this regatta we are still having the debate about NSW Zodiacs. Have a great weekend! Sue Manning River Dragons have had an exciting few months with 2 Junior Paddlers Sean Page and Sam Thomson Paddling at the World Championships in Canada bringing home 7 Gold and 1 silver medal.
In October 19 of our paddlers joined NSW North Coast Motley Crew and competed at The Australian Masters Games Adelaide coming home with Gold, Silver and Bronze medals. Was a great time had by all paddlers. Our Neighbours Pearl Dragons Forster hosted a very successful regatta in November which we competed in Womens and Mixed teams. Manning River Dragons were in great form and hungry to finally win a silver trophy in the Womens final and just missing out on the mixed final.Last weekend Mary Weaver and Tanya White undertook coaching sessions in Taree and they were fantastic! Mary and Tanya were the Australian coaches that worked with Sean and Sam to achieve their success in Canada. They worked with 16 of our club paddlers on Saturday afternoon and 24 juniors/U24/premiers from across NSW for 6 hours on Sunday. The young paddlers travelled from Grafton, Coffs and Armidale to attend the mini-camp; and were accompanied by some of the Sydney paddlers who were also in the Auroras team. Anyone who attended on Sunday saw the enthusiasm of our young paddlers – they love the sport and the friendships they have made. Also, seeing Mary and Tanya work with the kids was fantastic, they have a great bond with the kids. Mary and Tanya combined land work with paddling sessions. The techniques and the exercises were great. We all came away with a better understanding of how we can improve our strokes and “move the boat”. By the end of the weekend we were exhausted. Most really felt it in their thighs and struggled to walk the next day. It was a great success and we would love to follow up with another session next year. Two of our Juniors Sean Page & Alister Adamson have been selected in the State Team. Maureen Pratten Publicity Officer |
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