Philippine dragon boat paddlers hope to land a medal to kick off Worlds bid

MANILA, Philippines—The Philippines hopes to land a medal in the Premier 1,000m race on Aug. 4 to start off its campaign at the 10th World Dragon Boat Championships in Tampa Bay, Florida, U.S.A.

The event on Thursday will be held at 11:30 am Florida time (11:30 pm Manila time).

It was in the premier 1,000m event where the Philippine Dragon Boat Team won a bronze (3:55.32) at the 2007 8th Worlds in Sydney, Australia behind the United States (3:52.74) and the United Kingdom (3:53.29).

That bronze medal feat was better than the country’s fifth-place finish in the same event at the 2005 Worlds in Berlin, Germany, and the sixth-place feat at the 2004 edition in Shanghai, China.

But this cash-strapped national team will be defending the 200m Premier Mixed and 200m Premier Open events’ world titles that the Philippines won at the 9th Worlds held in Prague, Czech Republic in 2009 on August 5.

That Friday, the 200m Premier Mixed event’s preliminaries begin at 8:50 a.m. (8:50 p.m. Manila time) while races for the 200m Premier Open event start 2:35 p.m. (2:35 a.m. August 6).

The Philippines, in Prague, won the gold at the 200m Premier Mixed event (over China and Germany) and the 200m Premier Open event (winning by just a tenth of a second behind China,) with hosts Czech Republic salvaging the bronze.

At the 2007 Worlds, the Philippines reigned the 200m Premier Open event—winning the said race over China (by just 0.13 of a second) and the United Kingdom.

The Filipinos also won a silver in Prague at the 500m Premier Open event, rowing just by over a second behind the Americans.

The International Dragon Boat Federation’s biennial world championships have events for juniors, women, open, and mixed. Distances of the races are 200, 500, 1,000 and 2,000 meters. Competitors use what organizers call small boats (with up to 10 paddlers), standard boats (with up to 22 paddlers), and traditional boats (with up to 50 paddlers).

But the Philippine Dragon Boat Federation, prior to flying into Florida earlier this week, lamented the lack of funds the team has while preparing for Florida.

Even while two Lucio Tan-run companies, Philippine Airlines and Asia Brewery (which manufactures Cobra Energy Drink), had to be the team’s godfather, PDBF had to raise cash and in-kind donations to the Filipino public.

The contributor is a Journalism instructor at the University of Santo Tomas.