2007 Tartan Day celebrations at Doolin's Irish Pub – we became Kilts Night poster boys and girls!!!
 
Gung Haggis Fat Choy
dragon boat team fundraiser
Doolin's Irish Pub
 
$10 for 1 beer + 1 burger
proceeds to Gung Haggis Fat Choy dragon boat team
 
June 5th
Thursday
7-9pm

followed by
KILTS NIGHT
-wear a kilt get a pint of Guinness FREE

free music with
Halifax Wharf Rats
Celtic tinged folk and rock music

Doolin's Irish Pub
654 Nelson at Granville
Vancouver BC V6B 6K4

Tickets available from team members
for more information:
email: gunghaggis@yahoo.ca

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
We will distribute tickets on SUNDAY

If 20 people buy tickets – we get $200
and we can buy food drink for festivals

If 40 people buy tickets – we get $400
– we can pay for the paddling clinic with Olympian Kamini Jain

if 60 people buy tickets – we get $600
– we can pay for early bird registration for Taiwanese Race

If 100 people buy tickets – we get $1000
– we can pay for all the above – if we also do a raffle or 50/50 draw.

Eating is important.  It gives us energy on a dragon boat. 
Dragon Boat Nutrition: What to eat before a dragon boat race or practice?

Dragon Boat racing is very short 2minutes to 4 minutes or even a longer 12 minute races,
depending if you are a competitive, recreation or novice paddler, or if
you are racing 250m sprint, standard 500m, 1000m, or 2000m Guts &
Glory races..  So it's neither a pure sprint or a marathon event.

During the first 6-8 seconds you use the ATP-CP energy (immediate/stored energy) systems in your muscles. 
So I will usually eat more protein the night before such as a steak or fish dinner. 

Next you use the short-term glycolytic energy system which usually lasts for 90 seconds to 2 minutes.
Eat
lots of good carbohydrates, this will give you the energy for the
glycolytic and aeorobic energy systems.  This means lot of good fruits,
vegetables, pastas, rice, etc.

But this energy system also gives
you the lactic acid burn – so train for increased lactic acid
tolerance.  This means lots of short drills for 30 seconds, such as
interval training.  20 seconds paddle, 30-60 second rest, repeat.

Finally
you start using the long term aeorobic system – 60-90 seconds into your
activity –  which is why marathon bike racers do carb-loading by eating
huge pasta dinners before the Tour de France, because they want more
carbohydrate energy to burn in their bodies.  So again, eat lots of
carbohydrates such as fruits, vegetables, pastas, rice.  Ideal for any
paddler going into Guts & Glory.

RACE DAY: avoid
eating greasy fatty foods.  This will sit in your system for  4-6
hours.  Avoid being the paddler who orders a hamburger, then has to
scarf it down because the order came late, and their team has just been
called to marshall.   

Pasta,
rice and vegetable dishes are ideal lunches for afternoon practices,
they are easily digested and you will have lots of energy to burn.

Avoid
eating large amounts of refined sugars such as candy bars or soft
drinks just before going out on the boat.  It will affect your blood
sugar levels and actually weaken your strength, and take longer to
break down.  However, once you are actively working out, sports drinks
or juices are ideal for replenishing your system.  Drink lots of water
during the day to avoid dehydration especially on hot days.  Remember
that coffee, teas and alcohol can actually dehydrate the body. 

Bring
a snack to eat and drink right after practice.  This will help prevent
carbohydrate depletion and offset fatigue.  Juices, fruits and energy
bars are ideal.  Bananas are always favorites of athletes. 

My
favorite foods between races are Bananas, fruit smoothies or carrot
& fruit juices – easy to digest, and fast energy. You can also try
protein shakes.

After the last race of the day… carbohydrate replenishment choice is a nice dark beer! 

Paddling on False Creek in the sunshine… with friends… on a dragon boat team.  Very Vancouver!

I love the Gung Haggis Fat Choy dragonboat team.  I have managed and coached it since 2002, when the team morphed from the former Celebration team, which I had created in 1997.

This past Sunday, we did some full 500m race pieces.  You could feel the power in the boat.  Some of the rookies still need to develop their timing and many paddlers still need to develop their cardio.  But the potential is there and we are very happy with our development this year.

Our core paddlers are so enthusiastic they wanted to start paddling in February.  I told them they were crazy and should go skiing instead… but happily relented and joined them, when a Global television crew wanted to film us for their “Best of BC” news series representing cultural diversity.


The Gung Haggis Fat Choy dragon boat team is about opportunities. 
It's
about community building.  It's about making cultural statements.  It's
about having fun and making friends.
And it's about dragon boat racing….

This year I wanted to create two dragon boat teams.  We now have about 35 active paddlers, coming to practices on Sunday afternoon at 1:30pm and Tuesday and Wednesday evenings at 6pm.  Our system is flexible.  Come at least once a week, twice is recommended.  Pick a day, paddle, bring a friend and have some fun.  Each practice is different with different combinations of paddlers.  Everybody is getting to know each other, and we are encouraging more responsibilities and team leaders.

Last year we raced 7 dragon boat races + 2 canoe regattas.  We will do similar this year, starting on May 17th at the Lotus Sports Club Bill Alley dragonboat regatta.

This year is special.
Two weeks ago we had two time Olympic kayak racer Kamini Jain come out and give us a paddle clinic.  It really helped the team both improve their paddling, and as a bonding experience.  They got to watch each other on the video, cheer for each other, and encourage each other… which is what we do on the boat all the time.  Amazingly, Kamini really complimented many of our rookie paddlers.  She was amazed that some of them had only been on a boat for 6 or 7 times.


This year's Gung Haggis team is going to be incredible.
Adding the CC Dragons paddlers gives us so much more experience in the boat.
I have been drumming during our race pieces “as coach” waiting for our “star drummer” to come out.

Imagine conducting a symphony… where everybody knows what to do, when
to do it.  All you have to do is wave your arms, and signal the
transitions.

You don't do any counting… the team does it…. mentally… or only for key words.

You stand at the front, watch them, guide them, encourage them, coach
them.  giving out cue words…. like a race jockey on a thoroughbred
horse.

Olympic paddler Kamini Jain gives paddle clinic to Gung Haggis Fat Choy dragon boat team

Kamini
Jain came out to give a paddle clinic. She is coach of the False Creek
Mixed and FC Mens teams – that brought home medals from the World
Championships last September in Sydney Australia.  Kamini is also a
two-time Olympic paddler at the Sydney and Athens summer Olympic games.  And she is v-e-r-y “Gung Haggis” with both South Asian and Italian ancestry.

Kamini
watched the team paddle out for their warm up from the coach boat,
while Todd got used to steering the boat with a little out board and
very sensitive throttle grip.

Then Kamini climbed into boat and gave a drill:
stretching
forward with your hand along the gunnel of the boat until your arm was
parallel with the water.  That's how far your reach should be she said.
A 2nd drill:  paddling only with the bottom hand… and reaching as far as the first drill

• She went down the boat making
  adjustments for each paddler. 
• She gave demonstrations for the reach and how to grip the paddle (no champagne glass two finger grips)

Kamini makes Stephen M utilize all his potential r-e-a-c-h!

Kamini did some paddle correction with each paddler
most notable:

1. more stretch
2. more forward lean
3. working the hinge at the waist
4. bottom hand placement

Good s-t-r-e-t-c-h Jane!

some of the corrections she made on the video were:

1. more reach
2. bottom arm extended straight out (more reach)
3. top hand staying high (not dropping out of the boat)
4. exit – not flaring out
5. recovery – not pulling the paddle into your body
6. move head forward when you pull
7. don't lean too far out
8. get paddle deep in the water for the catch
9. don't exit too late
10. don't sit back too far at the end of your stroke
11. use hips more

There were lots of compliments:

1. good reach
2. good top hands
3. good
   blending
4. good rotation
5. good hips
6. deep paddles
7. rookies are looking real good

Attending the practice today were, in order of appearance on the video:

LEFT SIDE of the Boat

1) Gayle
2) Hillary
3) Keng
4) Alyssa
5) Joy
6) Ernest
7) Steve Behn
8) Joe
9) Raphael
10) Don
11) Christina

RIGHT Side of the boat

1) Tzhe
2) Jane
3) Cindy
4) Colleen
5) Leanne
6) Stephen Mirowski
7) Steven (“Yoga”) Wong
8) Devin
9) Sean John
10) Paulette
11) Pam

+
Michael
Gerard
Marion

Following
both Tuesday and Wednesday practices.  We will take the dvd to “The
Clubhouse” japanese restaurant – where we can watch the dvd, on a large
screen, while we enjoy cabohydrate replenishment.

Tuesday roster
will be limited to 22 paddlers, as last week we had the max, and not
enough on Wednesday to go out. Very sad and unfair to the paddlers who
came out on Wed.

please hit reply
to myself and Stephen Mirowski, so we can have a roster count confirmed for each day. 

If
you can only attend on Tuesday (some paddlers have classes on Wed) they
will be priority for Tuesday.  If you can attend either – please come
on Wednesday.

If there are 14 or 16 paddlers on each evening, it
makes it easier for me to do more one-to-one work with individual
paddlers.  If there is a full boat, I am less likely to do individual
paddler corrections. hint… more personal coaching on Wednesday!!!

see all the pictures:

Gung Haggis dragon boat paddle clinic…

Cheers, Todd