I understand that both Mayfair and the Beasts are racing in this festival on July 18.

Is there a list of crews entered yet?

Too bad we won't see False Creek racing, but which of Mayfair and the Beasts will be fastest?

Don't discount CSDC. 2nd on the island and gave Mayfair a good run for the money.

Mayfair is in a different league than the Beasts. Their women are so much better. I agree CSDBC will come second.

The Beasts can easily win it all...they are the pride of NS!

I am tied of hearing all about CSDC!

Ladies and Gentlemen get over yourselves for once. You guys are old and you guys kick butt and paddle hard but your attitude and BS sucks for the sport!

CSDC stirs up more crap than most of the Dragon boat community knows.

My advise to CSDC is be humble about your skills and success and you will garner so much more respect.

Maybe even others will want to learn from you vs. loathe you!

From one seriously competitive paddler who has beaten and lost to CSDC but never enjoys racing against them just too much BS and Politics !

Ok Mr. Dragon Boat Forum Owner,

Clearly you know the IPs and can trace them back to CSDC IP addresses. How the hell do you know who is posting this ****. If anything you're the one causing **** and being slanderous by accusing a team that everyone has known to be classy and quiet/humble about their accomplishments.

There has been no trash talking about CSDC on this forum until this year. You have to wonder there is someone out there - a really bad apple - that is spreading **** because they have an agenda.

Who hates CSDC? Maybe you know but name teams that they are adversarial against.

This news of everyone hating this crew is news to all of us. Way to manipulate the truth.

And in case you didnt' get it, clearly you don't run the forum otherwise you'd know it wasn't people from CSDC talking about them all the time.

So more importantly. What's the deal with the PFD's for this event?

Do we have to wear them or what?

What event? Aren't all park permits cancelled due to the strike?

"Ladies and Gentlemen get over yourselves for once. You guys are old and you guys kick butt and paddle hard but your attitude and BS sucks for the sport!"

Get your head out of your ass. CSDC are one of the classiest group of people I have ever met. Experienced, strong, fast and way above all this stuff you are accusing them of.

CSDC knows how to use the internet?
I thought they still use morse code to communicate?

I can't believe the drama this sport creates, the tension between teams and paddlers is kind of disappointing. To point fingers and calling out a team, isn't going to make your life better in anyway - so why do you do it in the first place?... grow up and take your frustations out on something else than spreading your hate through the DB community.

I dont understand why people are picking on CSDC. Is it the reason why people sometimes pick on Mayfair. A whole bunch of haters out there. They're good and consistently fast. Leave them alone. But yes still not as fast as mayfair.

Well anyway on another note is this GWN Sports regatta going to happen anyway with this dumbass strike thats seem to be going longer than it should.

Yes, its tough being at the top. Depends on who's the flavour of the month. Mayfair wasn't wearing PFD's, blah blah, Seniors are cocky, False Creek can't steer properly, Hydro is losing it, Big Fish is lucky, Hanalei is riding wash, Piranhas are over training...

Holy smokes... there are a lot of whiners here. Maybe you should form Napa Vallet Whiners instead of the Mofos...

Shut up and paddle!

Sorry to branch off on a tangent here but this is to the moderator(s). I don't understand why this can't be a registered forum. All reputable communities have forums but usually registered ones. Sure, everyone will know who is saying what but we're adults here (most of us) and we shouldn't have to hide. It also makes comments from certain people more credible. It's better to make these comments with a name as opposed to finding out later who it was stirring up sh*t....or maybe registering will take away the fun of starting dumb battles which this forum is good at.

It was done. A forum requiring registration was created and no one gave it a second look.

You can do it yourself. These things are free and you can set up your own forum that requires the most basic of registration without even requiring confirmation to have access.

It's free if you don't mind the advertising, or for a whopping $7 bucks a month it can be ad free. No more stupid beeping or chirping on the index page depending on the ad.

In any case go ahead and give it a try. I would sign up, but I think few others would. You could of course still sign up with some completely random untraceable name.

So will the city strike affect this race (if the strike is still on next week)?

Clearly nobody on this forum knows...try emailing GWN.

Do we have to wear pfds? Since this is a sport regatta, I'm guessing, no?

Apparently we do have to wear them because there are some non DBC registered teams participating.

Non-registered teams = no PDF exemption. I say let the non-registered teams wear their stupid PDF if they don't want to register. It's their choice so why do we all have to have the hassle of PDF's.

Will be funny to see all the Dragon Boat East folks in those festival PFD's.

At the least I guess that GWN shouldn't have used the word "SPORT" in the title. Just a little missleading as they had to know we would all assume it would be... well... A SPORT regatta and PDF's would not be required.

It's too bad these few teams aren't buying in.

A festival sets itself up as a sport race and attracts the best crews. Then a few community type crews complain that they want to race the best, but don't want to buy-in and support the sport. Too bad the community crews got their way.

Which community teams? Let's start a witch hunt!

kidding (sort of)

Has GWN sent out a race schedule yet?

When can we expect the race schedule to be posted.....only 10 days to go.

10 days... RELAX. How many festivals send the schedule 10 days before the event?

Things were so quiet last year.

Good to see Blake and his croonies are causing sh*t again this year for no reason.

I miss the days of senseless arguing between mike and sharifa.

I bet this has nothing to do with Blake. It's all about a festival masquerading itself as a Sport Regatta.

I'll be there with my DBC registered crew and I will be pretty pissed if I have to wear PFDs.

Any other out of town teams coming to race? It would be nice to see some Quebec teams in addition to see the Beasts. Is Sudbury coming as well?

I can gurantee that everyone will need to wear a PFD.

So let me get this straight... The majority who signed up expecting true sport racing conditions will be inconvenienced in order to satisfy a couple crews who are too cheap to pay for $15 DBC memberships?

Whoever you are your penny-pinching team just saved $300 and inconvenienced everybody else in the field. You think we'll be able to figure out who you are on Saturday? Wear your self-centered cheapskate badges with pride.

I predict... there will be a PFD exemption. You heard it here first!

if they do then the event is in violation of sport racing rules and event membership with DBC would have to be revoked.

"if they do then the event is in violation of sport racing rules and event membership with DBC would have to be revoked."

So...they aren't a sport race if they require PFD's, but they should lose their "event membership" with DBC if they get a PFD exemption and can once again allow teams to race as a "sport" regatta would be expected?

You can't suck and blow at the same time. Looks like someone just has a bug up their a$$ about this regatta, they can't win either way.


Personally I think the PFD bru-haha has been overdone here. PFD's or not, I look forward to racing good teams and the more of them the better. I prefer to now wear a PFD, but not if it costs us 25% of the participants.

You people are such whiners. It's not good enough that you will get to race against some of the top teams in the province (and country)?! Yah, it sucks to have to wear PFD for a sport regatta, but to keep going on about it like a broken record, it's annoying even by this forum's standards.

Think of the positive of having to wear a PFD, you now have an excuse for losing to Mayfair (see "How come" thread) or whoever.

Shut up and paddle!

"Think of the positive of having to wear a PFD, you now have an excuse for losing to Mayfair (see "How come" thread) or whoever. "

True say.

I would like to see everyone whooped by Mayfair (probably not including the Beasts though) while they wear PFD's with middle fingers on their back.

The last three posters smell like GWN boosters. Its a legitimate complaint. You guys are just trying to distort it by commenting on how great the competition is. The competition would be the same if we didn't wear PFDs and if we did. So your point is irrelevant. The PFD problem is legitimate becuase that is part of how DBC sold sport racing to all of us. It's not the only reason but I clearly recall seeing people write on this very forum that if we wanted to race without PFDs we should race in sport regattas. What now?

What if FMG managed to get FCRCC, Beasts and Mayfair to all race somehow? Are we supposed to "shut up and paddle" when they do their patented idiotic antics?

If we do wear PFDs, it will show that GWN went for the money and DBC shows that they are clearly toothless.

If I have to waer a PFD I will ask for my DBC money back.

Everyone else should too.

You completely missed my point. There is nothing to distort. Your beef is absolutely legitimate - it sucks, I get it. But when there are 60 other posts over 2 threads about the same thing, it gets a little boring. Take it up with GWN if you are that upset about it. I'm sure that Chloe and company also got the message. I would be bitter if this happened every year at GWN run "Sports" Regattas, but that is not the case. Suck it up and paddle. I would rather concentrate on the dogfight that is going to happen this Saturday than this mickey mouse business with PFDs.

BTW, I am not a GWN "supporter" in the sense you are trying to infer, but I do prefer GWN run regattas over ones run by the competition. And your FMG analogy makes no sense. How can you compare a bunch of verbally abusive DB nazis who don't know their ass from a hole in the ground to having wear PFDs this one time?? Also your DBC membership goes a little further than just not wearing a PFD.

I'll see you on the water this Saturday. I'm going to be the one that is wearing a PFD and not complaining.

Cheers.

Good for you. But I'm going to complain. It is a big issue with my team. One of the main reassons we support sport racing is the PFD exemption, DBC has very few other good incentives (and don't give me this insurance bull).

It's frustrating as a participant who wants to support both DBC and GWN but can't get a clear message from either.

There must be some sort of childish backroom stuff happening that is not allowing proper decissions to be made.

I'll be there. But don't ask my team to register DBC again.

GWN - stop the madness.

Is this a Sport Race, as promoted by you, or not?

A Sport race does not have PFD's, has roster rules, etc.

Please clarify.

It seems so simple.

DBC registered teams are exempt from wearing PFD's. Others who are not can wear theirs. Sucks to be them, but why should the rest of us suffer?

Or give them their own division like Pickering does. Oh, but I guess then they may not have registered right?

In either case, this regatta is going to go through the grinder next year when it's announced as people ask if it's really a sport festival or just being called one.

I actually don't even care all that much about the PDF thing to be honest, but I'm not all that crazy about buying one thing and then receiving another. Any way you slice it, there isn't a DBC registered crew out there that was expecting to have to wear PFD's to this thing and I'm not exactly sure how or when they would have told us if it hadn't sneaked out.

I not aware that our team was sent anything regarding the need to bring our PFD's.

Coul GWN or DBC please clarify what is going on?

Why is this happening?

Sport racing has defined rules by DBC. Why is GWN changing DBC rules.

It makes no sense. I would think that if GWN wants to promote sport racing they should follow sport racing guidlines???

Again PLEASE clarify why GWN can't follow sport racing guidlines????

All i got to say is when are they posting the schedule its like wednesday already before this big weekend

I think this is a GWN f-up not DBC.

GWN advertised sport racing took the money and now won't follow sport racing rules.

I'm going to put this behind me and race with a PFD but this will be my last "sport" race that I attend involving GWN.

No kidding! Only 3 days to go and no Race Schedule yet! Come on, get your sh*t together.

waaaaahhh.. i'm so elite... i don't need to wear a pfd.... waaaahhhh.. i'm special because i'm in the sport division... waaaahhh the pfd makes my performance suffer... wwwaaaahhh.... i don't think i'll be able to paddle well if i wear a pfd... the mental toll is just too much...waaahhhhh

maybe you just suck. wear it and shut it.

thanks!

>No kidding! Only 3 days to go and no Race Schedule yet!

Whats the big deal. As with every other race be there at 7:30 am. You will be finished around 5pm.

There are probably less then 6 mixed sports div teams, 6 ladies sports div teams and 6 open sports div teams, so you will be racing the same 5 teams all day.

Rumour on the street is the DBC folks are extremely miffed with GWN who like bully the organization around.

Wow, July 15 2009, 12:26 PM you are a real idiot aren't you?

Sure some people whine more than others, but everyone who is a DBC member and signed up for what was promoted as and what we thought was a DBC sanctioned "SPORT" regatta has every right to be a little ticked off.

I'm sure you can imagine all kinds of similar circumstances where this would maybe not be acceptable to you. Let's say Rogers were to all of a sudden stop offering TSN in HD and just said, well you can still see everything in SD so what's the big deal. Or you get a hamburger instead of a cheeseburger and the restaurant says heck, it's still a burger what's the big deal?

And you might say that you paid specifically in those examples, well so did we all. We paid per paddler sport racing rates for the format which includes the PFD waver. Some may put less or more of a value than others on that, but who are we to say they are not justified to be upset.

Get a grip. I hate to say it, but you must either be associated with GWM or on one of these teams that are not DBC registered and your getting some flack and don't like it. To be fair, I doubt GWN made much of a big deal about it to the non-DBC registered teams and I feel kinda bad for them as they probably had no idea what they were getting into with the PFD thing.

The mess is clearly in GWN's court. They wanted to draw top teams with a Sport regatta as well as numbers by having it be an almost perfectly timed warmup for the Nationals/Race Off next month. All good. But then a couple non-DBC registered teams came along (or rather their money did) and they decided to screw the pooch for the extra money.

And now with less than 3 days until it starts, I don't think anyone has gotten any kind of official word on the schedule, PFD's or otherwise.

I'm actually very surprised. I like GWN. I would rather do a GWN run event than one run by anyone else, but it looks like they goofed up here.

You should try Water's Edge out west. They are just as good as GWN. We just don't see them here cuz its GWN territory.

I'm fine with wearing a PFD but it would be nice to see the race lineup and schedule.

This is %100 a GWN screw up. The surprising thing is that a traditionally great event manager like GWN won't just do the right thing and fix the problem (or at least do some explaining!).

Since they just announced the prize pool, they must have their final team list. I would expect the schedule soon. From their website:

Final 2009 Prize Pool Distribution
1st Place 2nd Place 3rd Place

Premier Mixed
$660.00 $400.00 $110.00
Premier Women
$190.00 $115.00 $30.00
Premier Open
$125.00 $75.00 $25.00
Senior Mixed
$125.00 $55.00
Senior Women
$145.00 $65.00
Grand Dragon Mixed
$120.00

I think they may as well give a case of beer to third place in Open. It would be more appreciated than a cheque for $25. Not that I'm complaining.

It's up

The first round is posted. Looks like 35 or so crews. It will be good racing PFD on or off.

I like the fact that GWN can't spell Piranhas either.

LOL....saw that too.

Looks like the non-DBC teams have been broken out into their own little 5-team division.

PFD issue resolved?

Still no news on the PFDs.....

Spoke to someone at DBC who said they were required, but GWN office says they're not.

Who's On s'en calisse?

Probably depends if you're racing the Premier or Festival. Premier = PFD except, Festival = PFD required.

"Spoke to someone at DBC who said they were required, but GWN office says they're not."

Probably depends on who is running the festival. I paid GWN, so I will go with their answer.

I told you so.

Hello Team Captains,

Thank you for supporting the GWN Sport Regatta. Over the past couple
weeks there have been a number of questions regarding the event. I
would like to briefly provide clear answers to the big questions. But
first I want to apologize for the delay.

**** ---> 1. All crews participating in the GWN Sport Regatta are PFD exempt <--- **** <br> 2. All crews will race against each other in their respective divisions
3. The city strike will not effect the event
4. The schedule has been delayed because of a number of late
registrants over the past few days. The first round is attached. The
general flow of the event is as follows:

200m Round 1
200m Round 2
500m Round 1
500m Round 2
2000m

If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to call or email me
directly.

See you on the weekend.

Thanks,
Aaron

Aaron Soroka
Vice President
GWN Dragon Boat
T. 416.962.8899
C. 416.997.2453
aaron@gwndragonboat.com

Since this is a Predictions thread, I'll toss in the first one.

Sport Premier Mixed
1. Mayfair: They will eek out victories in the 500m and 200m to win the overall crown

2. Beasts: Handily win the 2000m, but just too heavy a boat to get going and beat Mayfair in the sprints. Will make it very close.

3. On S'en Calisse: know nothing about these guys, but I'm going to assume that they are a throw together of the best Quebec has to offer. If not, I will put them 4 or 5 spots lower.

4. Heat: If this is the same team that was at Pickering, they will be very strong in the 500m and 2000m.

5. Big Fish: Let's see if they can keep the momentum from their Island results. Could be a couple of spots higher or lower.

6. Hanalei: Slow start to season, but will start to regain their form here.

7. Piranhas: Will give 4-6 a run for their money, but not quite enough to break top 6.

8. Team Chaos: Very focused goal of winning a spot for Macau, but early results weren't fantastic (see Milton). Could surprise and move a few spots up.

9. White Heat: Another solid performer from Pickering

10. Hammerheads: potentially top 6 after 200m and 500m, but drop way down with their achilles heel - the 2000m.

11. MOFOs: Good team, but too strong a field for them to make a big splash

12. Shockwave: See #11.
---------------------------------------------

Sport Senior Mixed
1. CSDC: No brainer in ths category
2. PDBC Masters: should be able to knock off #3
3. Quicksilver: Close, but no cigar
---------------------------------------------

Festival Mixed
1. Jetstart: It's going to be a boring day of open water victories for these guys
2. Komodo Dragons: Should be a lock for 2nd with no real challengers.
3-6. roll the dice
---------------------------------------------

Premier Women
1. ADBC Women: Theirs to lose
2. Heat Women: will be close to #1
3. Stratford Women: Good crew, but not quite there with #1 and #2
4. Rowbust: Pretty quick for a BCS crew
5. Galley Girls: don't know them
---------------------------------------------

Premier Open
1. ADBC1: Without Scotia/Piranhas open here, they should take this handily
2. ADBC2: #1 took all their best paddlers
3. Heat: Should be competitive if their mixed crew is any indication
4. Shaka: Disappointing showing at the Island, could potentially redeem themselves here and move up a couple of spots.

anon@July 15 2009, 12:19 PM said:
I'm going to put this behind me and race with a PFD but this will be my last "sport" race that I attend involving GWN.


Hey moron. Well done jumping the gun. We have plenty of conclusion jumping f$@ktards like yourself on this forum. Go jump off a bridge.

anon @ July 13 2009, 4:18 PM said:
"I can gurantee that everyone will need to wear a PFD."


Hey Moron,

Your guarantee ain't worth $hit now is it? Enjoy riling up the crowd? Do us a favour and go suck on some lead, f$%ktard.

Only the 200m Race Schedule is up and the Race Numbers compared to Race Times are screwed up. Sad.

lol - Sounds more like Lively Dragon than GWN

The Piranhas won't be the same crew from the Island. I think it's a mix of Rouge/Scotia/Piranhas.















(and no, I'm not Rob)

Seriously, what the hell is happening at GWN?

With Jim on board these types of problems never seemed to happen. What a lapse in communication.

Has Aaron ever been in a dragon boat?

http://www.gwndragonboat.com/pub/docs/2009%20GWN%20Sport%20Regatta%20Round%201.pdf

Race times and heats now match. They've gone to every 10 minutes instead of 12 minutes. Hope they'll be on time. Want to see the 2k's happen.

I thought that Piranhas were always pretty much a mix of Rouge/Scotia and Piranhas. Depending on which race your talking about as to how much of which is which.

Since Scotia raced sport at Pickering I would assume that this would be Piranhas with OTHER members from Scotia/Rouge otherwise they have some roster issues with DBC possibly. Did Piranhas and/or Scotia use TIDBFR as a qualifier? If so then their rosters can't be all that different from the ones they had there now could they.

In any case, they aren't touching Beasts or Mayfair.

While we are at it, the same would go for these guys "On S'en Calisse". If they are a mix of paddlers from various Montreal teams, then I guess none of them will be racing at the Nationals with their local MTL teams then?

I guess we are going to see just how Wild Wild West our DBC Club Crew thing is or is not.

Only 12 sport mixed crews. Well, at least they're all pretty strong.

Where's the rest of the schedule?! Still only 200M races are posted.

Less than 2 days to go.

As the schedule is now up we can all see how sparsely this event is being attended, only 35 crews total. Now we know why GWN/Aaron bent over backwards to accept those 5 non-DBC crews - they really needed the money. Also makes the MLDB cash/prize program GWN broadcasts all over there website looks pretty pathetic - squabbling over such small amounts. Look at the projected amount they originally estimated and the actual amount. Hey GWN that should tell you all you need to know - in the DB communities eyes you ain't all that anymore.

tell me, did you snap your fingers and do that zig-zag thing in the air after you typed that message?

OK - there have been some bugs in getting the schedule out. But they got the PFD thing correct, they have arranged the site despite the strike, and I think 35 crews for a sport event is pretty good. That's 700 people ( some will race in more than 1 crew) but it's still much larger than any sprint tegatta, except maybe CKC Nationals, and I don't know if they get 700 competitors even at that.

Good for GWN - please know that the large majority of the Dragon boat community appreciates your efforts this past week in making this happen.

I am NOT a GWN employee!

35 crews is not bad for a Sport regatta. The problem is that most crews are in the beginner to intermediate classification and may actually be intimidated or disinclined to enter a sport regatta.

"Where's the rest of the schedule?! Still only 200M races are posted.

Less than 2 days to go"

Seeding for the 500M is going to be made based on the 200M

From their website:

Registration: Begins at 7:00 AM

Start Time: Begins promptly at 8:00 AM

End Time: Approx. 5:00 PM

Team Entry Fees / Registration / Waivers:
For information on team entry fees, registration process, using the crew management tool (waivers, under 18), please click here or click on the "Registration Info" link on the left navigation bar. Please note that all athletes must register online and sign their waivers electronically.

Photo ID: Each participant is responsible for bringing photo ID for registration purposes

PFD: All participants will be required to wear a PFD.

2000M Races: 2000M races will be added to the schedule if time permits.

So do we have to wear a pfd or not? Your website says one thing and your letter another.....

How long are you going to beat this to death? They already announced yesterday that all teams are PFD exempt. So they forgot to change one line on the website. Let move on to predictions.

The revocation of the sanction from DBC means that the game has changed

If you guys didn't already see...





July 16, 2009



GWN SPORT RACE DBC SANCTION WITHDRAWN



To DBC Members,



Dragon Boat Canada / Bateau- Dragon Canada (DBC) regrets to announce that it is withdrawing from the GWN Sport Race (to be held on Saturday, July 18). As a result of the revocation, DBC roster checks will not be administered at this regatta. We have taken this action because we have not received confirmation from GWN that the regatta will be held in compliance with the previously agreed upon terms for the awarding of a DBC sanction.



Given GWNs reputation for putting on high quality events, we wish for and hope that a great day of racing will be had by all.



Important for CCWC Qualifying Clubs: Our first concern is our Clubs and Racers. We are aware that Club Members may have registered to participate in the GWN Sport Regatta as a Qualifying Regatta to meet the eligibility requirements to challenge for a CCWC entry. Because of this last minute turn of events, we feel that our failure to recognize this regatta for purposes of Race-Off Regatta eligibility would unfairly impact interested Clubs.



We will honour the commitment of each Club that had intended to use the GWN Sport Regatta as a Qualifying Regatta provided you send your Clubs roster(s) for the GWN Sport Regatta to DBCs office before 9:00 a.m. (Eastern time) on Tuesday, July 21, 2009. By submitting your roster(s) to DBC, you will be certifying that all Racers listed on the roster(s) were present and race ready at the regatta. If you fail to send your roster(s) to DBC by the deadline, the GWN Sport Regatta will not be recognized as a Qualifying Regatta. No exceptions will be made.



DBC is making the above modification and blanket exemption from the requirements of its 2010 CCWC Protocol because of the unique circumstances connected with this regatta. All DBC Members and race organizers should take notice that DBC will not modify its CCWC Protocol or grant exemptions in the future should a similar situation occur.



We appreciate your support and understanding.



If you have any questions, please contact DBCs Executive Director, Chloe Greenhalgh, at execdirector@dragonboatcanada.org.



Dragon Boat Canada / Bateau-Dragon Canada

Good job DBC on telling people that you won't be pushed around!

Hey moron finder, it looks like your the moron now!

DBC has pulled it's sanction.

I wrote that it would be my last "sport" race run by GWN. Looks like my prediction came sooner than later!

This entire thing is such a joke, just like the prize money.

When the prize structure was initially announce I thought it might actually be prizes of significance. NOT!

That whats actually funny hearing people argue about this.

1) You want a sport race
2) Prizes to be significant

At this point you aren't going to have 1&2 together, just not enough teams to have a pool of money of any significance to give to the winners. You might have one of the other but to have both, certainly not any time soon. Thats right you can't have your cake and eat it too.

I understand that but the problem is being sold that!

Yeah GWN bit off more than they could chew on this one.

Should've either gone full sport or just another race festival, which looks like they'll have to do for next year. My guess it'll just be another race festival next year in order to attract more teams.

Question is who is dumb and who is dumber.
From what I can see these two groups are playing the ?who needs who more? game with egos and arrogance intact on both sides.

so i guess there goes the theory that DBC is controlled by Mike Kerkmann.

90 posts deep and there's only 1 prediction.

DBC taking on GWN is cool. Never thought it would happen.

"""I wrote that it would be my last "sport" race run by GWN. Looks like my prediction came sooner than later!"""

GWN coined the term sport racing before DBC even knew what that meant. This weekend will be more of a "sport" race than nationals. No one needs DBC to tell them their event is a sport race. No one owns the franchise on sport racing. GWN vs. DBC. Yes should be interesting.

GWN invented sport racing!

Love it.

As far as dragon boat racing is concerned the Welland "Sport" Regatta pre-dates any sort of DBC event or sanctioning so who has first rights to this sport racing thing then??

quite sure the Quebec cup run by 22D was running 2000m races and sport races as early as 2003

Actually, dragon boat canada organized the first race-off in Vancouver back in 2000. Things have evolved quite a bit since then....

I love how they still "seed" teams into lanes. What are probably considered the top three teams to beat are all in lane 4 for their first race. What are probably considered the next group of 3 are all in lane three for their first race etc.

I wonder if there will be a lane draw or seeding for Nationals?

Seeded or not, there is a lane bias at the race course that favours the outside lanes. So teams like Heat, Piranhas and Hammerheads actually got a better lane placement than the rest of the teams in their heat. Maybe it would have been better to be seeded lower?

I predict rain.

I predict isolated showers.

I agree that teams were seeded and that lower ranked teams actually ended up getting the best lanes. Well lower-middle ranked teams.

I don't get the justification for the seeding myself. Everyone pays the same amount. If they are so sure enough of the winners prior to racing why bother racing? AFAIK, no other paddle sports or rowing seed people for regattas. It provides a "free" means for organizers to try and give whomever they choose an edge. I don't see how the "sport" crews or DBC have allowed this to continue.

This practice directly undermines the integrity and fairness of the sport IMHO. It's embarrassing.

PS. I'm not even racing on one of these teams so you can't say this is just because someone is pissed about their lane assignment. It's practically the same a cheating if your not a favored team depending on the event. In this one it seems to have the most impact on the 3-6 and and 10 and below crews, but if they wanted in MTL they could put everyone but their preferred teams in the worst possible lanes.

We as paddlers need to simply insist that this practice be stopped or else we don't play.

Not sure about the seeding theory. I understand that Beasts and Mayfair would be considered the clear top 2. But Hanalei has less of claim on the third "top seed" than Big Fish does. Similarily, Shockwave has little claim to being seeded ahead of Piranhas, Hammerheads or Heat.

Canoeing and Rowing will seek for certain events.

As will swimming, tennis etc....

I don't think those numbers refer to seeding, I think its just the order in which people registered...

Many sports seed. Not many use an unspoken, unaccountable method.

mayfer
beasties
alliananalei
b-fish
on sen what?
heat
p-fish
k-os
j-start
hammers
shakawave
mofos

Well whaddya know - we have a second prediction! Only took over 100 posts to get here. So where is Soothsayer, End of Story, Prognostigator and company?

Looking forward to Soothsayer. He's hilarious.

I think you can toss the senior teams into the mix...

1. Mayfair
2. Beasts
3. CSDC
4. Big Fish
5. Hanalei
6. Piranhas
7. Heat
8. Chaos
9. On S'en Calisse (no idea who they are so will stick em in the middle)
10. Jetstart
11. Hammers
12. Quicksilver
13. Masters
13. Shockwave
14. Mofos
15. Komodos

mayfair
beasties
b-fish
on sen what?
heat
alliananalei
p-fish
hammers
j-start
k-os
shakawave
mofos

3-6 are almost a toss up and will largely depend on who actually paddles for On Sen What and AllianceHanalei. Since it appears our DBC Club Crew rules are pretty much wide open it's almost impossible to guess how strong they will be. Same goes for p-fish and hammers. The rest I think are pretty much crews unto themselves.

Whether lanes will or will not be a factor has yet to be decided and will of course be infinitely debated regardless.

Isn't calisse Frech/Quebecor for fukker?

Every major credible sport pre-seeds top teams or athletes otherwise let's just put the obvious top 10 teams into the first couple of races and we all can go home early.

I'm at the CKC national team trials in Montreal. All of our heats are seeded by the high performance director.

New Sched is up. With the withdrawal of DBC sanction, looks like GWN is going to lump all mixed teams (Premier, Senior, GM, Festival) together. That means CSDC, Jetstart, Komodo Dragons and Quicksilver should be in the mix for top 12 spots. They're also going with 2 consolations for 'A' division - So top 4 boats in 'A' Champ, 5-8 in 'A' Consolation1, 9-12 in 'A' Consolation2. Should be interesting.

Really, really hate to bring it up again, but with DBC sanction withdrawal and combining "Festival" teams with "Sport" teams, does this mean that PFDs are back?

I like the race progression. It's not like Pickering where one bad race will set you back all day.

I'm looking forward to this regatta tomorrow. It should be a ton of fun.

Sorry, correction - Looks like top 15 make 'A' division and 5 boats each in Champ, Consol1 and Consol2.

Ok so let me get this straight, there are going to be 15 teams that are going to be calling themselves A division paddlers?!

Will be kinda hard to fall out of C division then.

isn't Calisse some sort of swear word in french? i.e. Calisse TARBANEK!!!!

Predictions... including the senior teams, here's the top 15 crews for this weekend:

1) Mayfair
2) Dragon Beasts
3) CSDC
4) Hanalei
5) Big Fish
6) Piranhas
7) Heat
8) Hammerheads
9) Team Chaos
10) Jetstart
11) Quicksilver
12) MOFOS
13) On S'en Calisse
14) Shockwave
15) Komodo

*Notes: Should be extremely interesting between 1 and 2, I'm giving it to Mayfair only because they look unbeatable so far this year and they have "home course" advantage... kind of. The fight for 4 & 5 is a toss-up, I'm giving it to Hanalei despite the Pickering and Island results. Another close race between 8 and 10, Jetstart beat Chaos in Milton but I think Chaos is more consistent and Hammerheads should edge both. Lastly, I have no clue who "On S'en Calisse" is so I'm putting them ahead Shockwave and Komodos who are both clearly in a different class than the rest of the field.

To all of you non PDF users

remember Cambodia

The Montreal combo crew (Verdun and BMO) will be good....

Yes, but cracking the top 5 let alone the top 3 will be tougher'n hell from lane 3. They had the same challenge in Pickering and couldn't fight back from a bad 1st race lane. Same goes for any crew that doesn't have their first race in lane 4 or 5.

When I remake the world in my own image, I promise all lanes will be equal.

the only way for all lanes to be equal is to have all boats race in the same lane, one after the other, in an indoor course.

As someone who has put in buoys at the MBP race course 5 or 6 times, as well as seen depth charts from the Ministry, I can say that wind/wave conditions are the main factor.

And for all you dragon boat geeks (like me) that need to know, I'm going to post an Adobe Reader document titled "Western Beaches Sounding 2006" on the website www.takethelake.ca home page, right side (i dont have ability to post it anywhere else!) and we can all battle intelligently about what lane is the best.

From Joel's "Western Beaches Sounding 2006" document, it is quite obvious that lane 4 has a HUGE bias.

based upon the course, and racing it a few times, and depending on where the course is set.
I'd prefer lane 5.
If lane 6 is set too close to the rocks, it doesn't help.
There is however a difference of 3-4ft plus between lane 1 and 5

The teams should be seeded 5-4-3-2-1. The lane 5 starts at the rock wall and runs away from the wall finishing quite a distance from the wall. The course is not squared to anything. The lane 1 at the finish is much closer to the shore than in a past. Who is an architect, why?

Joel, that's interesting information, thanks for sharing. But I need some explanation to interpret it correctly.

First of all, are these all heights above sea level? The readings for the top fo the wall say 76.9m on top, the course seems to go as low as 69.5m. Is this vs. sea level, or some other standard?

Aside from that, this is from 3years ago, yes? So the course may have silted-in since then, right? So the readings may not be all that current.

The other, other thing is that I note that the soundings only go in as far as the old wall, not all the way to shore. I don't think this covers the whole course as it is currently laid out, but I'll have to look at it again tomorrow to be sure.

Makes no sense to me.

Everything in the water from what I can see is all within 1 (Is that meters from sea level? so all within a couple feet?) from the wall all the way to an inch off the park wall (it actually overlaps the park well onto dry land at that depth in fact. Can't be.

There is simply no way that waterway is the same depth 10 feet inside the break wall (rock wall) as it is just off the park wall.

A conspiracy theorist would perhaps suggest that some roughly even sounding area was super-imposed over a map of the shore and break wall. While I can't believe that is the case, I also can't believe that the depth of any body of water that big say (550m x 150m) would be that even.

I guess I'm not reading it right.

''New Sched is up. With the withdrawal of DBC sanction, looks like GWN is going to lump all mixed teams (Premier, Senior, GM, Festival) together. That means CSDC, Jetstart, Komodo Dragons and Quicksilver should be in the mix for top 12 spots.''

My predictions from the none DBC team that start the PDF issue with GWN and DBC is ...........the same who did it for Montreal festival. And from what I read here I will put my bet on Jetstart ,they didn't want to race in open water in there division ...

Well DUH.

Still, I'm sure they were assured there would be no issues and they would get to race all the teams when they registered also. Doesn't mean we have to be happy with whomever complained, but I'm sure they were put in this position by GWN just like the rest of us are now a little frustrated as well.

On another note, I see now that I missed that that was the original break wall in the sounding. I would think that that area still looks a little more even than you would think, but it should pretty much include/cover lanes 3-5 if not most of 2 and maybe some of 1 as well.

It would be interesting to know which way the current or tide or whatever water movement there is there flows and if it varies then which direction is prevalent.

I'm going to guess that since at the old OP site, the lanes on the lake-shore side seemed to bog down the closer you got to the finish line that the flow came from the finish line direction and as it turned that corner the OP side lanes 1, 2 etc were more sheltered from that effect. Silt was also deposited more on the outer lake-shore side more due to the increased flow.

Anyway, whats the point there. My idea is that for future races we should maybe be racing from East to West rather than the other way around. That way teams in the shallower shore side lanes would get more of a benefit from any flow which would help even out any depth differences. Sure it would be much worse from a spectator perspective, but I really think it would help even out any lane bias. It's to bad that the West side isn't a bit wider and angled. As it is, that end would make for a trickier post finish boat clearing.

1) Mayfair - I'd love to put the Beasts here but this race is in Toronto and I don't think every Beast was able to make it over while all the Predators can.
2) Dragon Beasts - Will make it closer than many thought.
3) CSDC - Clear third. But won't challenge.
4) Big Fish - Fish will peak here.
5) On S'en Calisse - Verdun/BMO Combo "should" be strong.
6) Hanalei - Lost 2 out of 3 meetings to #7 this year. But won the one that mattered most.
7) Piranhas - SRP could potentially be #3 here. Piranhas on their own? Not so much.
8) Heat - Big jump from last year. But this is a bigger dance now.
9) Jetstart - Will easily win the most hated team award if everyone ends up wearing PFDs
10) Team Chaos - Always the bridesmaid to J-Start.
11) Hammerheads - 2k will be their downfall
12) MOFOS - 12th overall but #1 in our hearts (when flexing that is)
13) Quicksilver - Toss up between 13 and 14
14) Shockwave - See 13
15) Komodo - DFL

to answer some of your questions:

* the dark line to the "top" is the location of the old breakwall

* the units are in metres, and represent elevation above sea level (I confirmed this by going to Google Earth)

* yes this was 2006 upon completion of the Rock Pile.

* having confirmed it's roughly 3 years old, I believe that the numbers are still accurate -- I had to dive down to the bottom when we dropped a nearly full spool of cable off the starting dock/raft. Plus setting up the course in 2007 the depths were similar. I can't see it changing that much in a year.

What some people don't realize is the ends of the course are not square (of course none of you as you all have the Adobe document as proof), they flare out towards the land (north) side. Result is if the start line is square to the west "wall" then the finish line would have to be a significant distance closer to the sea wall (land side).

I'm sure that the Ministries that created the course have done subsequent survey's, and these are part of public record. Some industrious person can go digging!

So who's predictions were the most accurate?

On s'en Calisse threw most people off although the first predictions had them bang on.

Lining up for the 200s you could see the weeds as far out as lanes 2 or 3. It's only going to be worse for the races in August and September.

The September races will have teams run their first two races in the same lanes then average the times before anyone gets seeded in the same way they do things at the island. This is really the only fair way to start any regatta where you're not 100% sure the lanes are fair. This means pretty much any regatta of course.

In fact this should especially be the case anywhere there is an attempt to "seed" teams by some unknown arbitrator of ranking. They should do this for Nationals. If the whole format can be run in one day at the GWN Sport Regatta then surely there could be an extra 500m or 200m added to the beginning of the Saturday races.

If we really want to make it even and just as fair for the team that maybe isn't "ranked" as the ones that are, that is pretty much the only way to do it. Otherwise I guess you need to run enough heats to ensure everyone gets lane 3/4.

This is an issue for most smaller one day festivals of course, but then generally it's not such a big concern for those participating.

Adding another 200m and 500m race to the day will put the number of races per person up to 7 and those who are doing the open races, 14! That seems to be an excessive amount of races per day!

...aka DBC nationals 2007

...aka Central region qualifier 2007

I think they meant add one or the other.

Whichever distance you do first, do two heats. One in lane 2 and one in lane 4 or in the case of the Nationals, One in lane 3 and one in 4 and average them to ensure your lane placements for the remainder of the event are based on a even starting point.

If you end up with a crappy lane after that, well then you made your own fate. For nationals I guess it depends on how many teams are competing. Like they said, if you can get them all in lane 3/4 for their first heats then I doubt it would matter much. Anywhere else needs to adjust to be fair though.

Not to worry, the Nationals schedule for Saturday: 500's all divisions and 2000's Open & Womens and Sunday: 200's all divisions and 2000's for Mixed

Most likely scenario will be max of 7 races each day for a paddler in both Mixed and Open/Women.

Sure beats that GWN regatta with 10 in 1 day. I'm still hurting.

Seven is still quite a lot.