by Linda Heistman
This week, my focus isn’t on the SHARP program, although it does show that seniors can be a force to be reckoned with!
On Saturday, August 8, a group of mainly Town of Webb area residents won first place in the St. Lawrence Dragon Boat Challenge on the St. Lawrence River in Waddington, NY, in a race between 15 other boats.
According to the event’s website, “Dragon boat racing is the one of the fastest growing sports in the world and the most fun, unique cultural event featuring adrenaline-pumping action. Teams of 20 paddlers, a drummer and steerer race in authentic, 46-foot-long dragon boats. All skill levels and physiques can paddle, making it the ultimate team-building sport, requiring synchronicity and finesse, more than power to win.”
As one of the intrepid participants, I was excited to see that we, The River Tarts, made news in the Watertown Daily Times.
Unfortunately, that paper did not really give an accurate portrayal of our team. It indicated that we paddled and trained together before the race.
However, many of us did not even know some of our paddling teammates until the morning of the 250 meter sprint race.
We had the same one-time practice the morning of the race, as did all of the other teams.
Every boat had a steerer provided for them, but each team had to provide their own drummer and twenty paddlers.
Joanne Maly and her daughter, Marissa Pavlus organized our team for this race asking people to invite others that they knew could paddle.
In our boat; we had three wonderful men and the rest were women.
There was a uniqueness to our team in that we came to this race from all different walks of life.
There were members who had no children and one woman who has six.
Most were from the Town of Webb area, but also from Saranac Lake and other areas.
What we all shared in common was a love of paddling, of life and of adventure.
At the start of the first race, another team was heckling us because we had a boat of mostly women ranging in age from the twenties to one woman in her mid-70’s.
In fact, we had at least four women over the age of 62…so, we kind of looked like an easy beat.
But, what the other teams did not know is that most of us understand the difference between knowing how to paddle and how to paddle correctly.
When people paddle as a team, each person must paddle in synch. Well, our team sure had the synch going on!
Another thing that they did not know is most of us come from communities that have to work together to make things happen, so although the people in our boat never had the chance to actually work together before, we already know what it is to work as a team.
Out of 16 boats in the qualifying race we placed first with a time of 1 minute, 17 seconds.
With the field reduced to eight boats in the second (final) race we dropped our time to 1 minute, 14 seconds and not only beat the second place team, but beat them by almost a Dragon-boat’s length!
Rack it up as another multi-generational group of people proving that differences in ages, backgrounds, and personalities should not stand in the way of doing things together.
Check out our photo on the home page of the challenge’s website: http://slrdragonboat
.com/.
SHARP is a free program offered to all independent senior citizens from Woodgate to Raquette Lake.
We meet at Niccolls Memorial Church in Old Forge from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. every Wednesday. Lunch during our regular Wednesday sessions is provided by the Community Health & Wellness Fund (formerly the Town of Webb Health Center Fund).
For more information, call or text (315) 225-7553, or email activitiescoordinator
4seniors@yahoo.com.