Dragon Boat Sport Today

Get Healthy, Get Fit, Get Outside!

People have been racing dragon boats for over 2,000 years.
The sport has 3 basic components: A boat, a steersperson, and a crew.
The crew sits side-by-side, and can have up to 22 per boat. Races are held around both the region and world, and at different levels of competition.

Dragon Boating is a fun, healthy, refreshing sport in open water and open air that imparts many physical and social benefits. It is one of the best sports for the core, legs, and back muscles, shoulders, arms and thighs.
It is a team sport with a dash of culture and a great competitive edge to surely bring that athlete out of you.

Imagine, on a sunny weekend on the the river at the heart of the Nations' Capital, or while on tour at any river across the US, Canada, Europe, Asia, Australia, or South Africa, you join hands with 19 other mates, paddling like mad along four or eight other colorful 45-foot boats,
to the loud drum beats and team yells while thousand spectators cheer on from the shore.

Picture yourself in the scene, the life, with one of the most fulfilling and cheerful team sport, seeing yourself take part in cutting through the water toward the finish line, pushing your limits and growing stronger in every stroke.

The team surges up because you are part of it. The team dances with you through each precise stroke to boil up that water in an awesome display of control, grace, and power.

In unison, you and the team fluidly blend together and become one, pushing your limits, learning anew that you are strongest when you fight to overcome your weakest moment together. You push, and the team pushes with you, you are totally bare, brave, honest, and you give absolutely, and then some. The finish line awaits you, embraces you, and the team is you, you, the team!

A Few Benefits of Dragon Boating

Teambuilding
Getting 22 people to do the same thing at precisely the same time takes a great deal of teamwork!

Core and Cardio exercise
This type of activity hits all the areas most gym workouts do not target, to include abs, all aspects of the back, and legs. Practices vary in length and exertion levels, but typically last for a full hour. You will typically burn around 700-1000 calories while enjoying the scenery of our nation’s capital!

Community
Anyone is welcome to join the fun. As this is a non-contact sport, a variety of age levels can participate.

Camaraderie
Make new friends and have new experiences.
Regional weekend travel to nearby cities for races, such as Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, and New York. Group activities such as white water rafting, tubing, and barbecues.

Leadership
Want to learn to coach or steer a dragon boat? We’ll teach you!
Leadership is many things, including sharing your skills with kids, helping expand our programs, or bringing a group of your own to join our club and share in the fun! Dragon Boating –

The Legend

The sport originated in agrarian days thousand years back, particularly in China, signifying the pre-planting season in May where village folks would gather for drinks, collaborative fun and festivities to heighten bonds and team spirit before they hit the fields to work hard together.

According to legend, Dragon Boat Festival occurs on the 5-th Day of the Fifth Month in the Chinese Lunar Calendar. Chinese people celebrate this day by wrapping rice dumplings in bamboo leaves and holding Dragon Boat races. The celebration of this festival is a tradition that has lasted over two thousand two hundred and ninety years, commemorating the great poet Chu Yuan (343-290 B.C.)  

Chu Yuan [Qu Yuan ] (340?-278 B.C.), the chief poet in the Songs of the Chu State, was a member of the ruling house, a statesman and diplomat. In his youth, he has a brilliant official career and was made a court minister and at one time the Chu envoy to Chi (in Shantung), a great neighboring state.

But Chu Yuan's comet-like success incurred the jealousy of his fellow ministers, who slandered and intrigued against him. In consequence Chu Yuan lost the king's favor and was dismissed from office. There were several ups and downs in his career - for after each banishment he was recalled to court, only to be again rebuffed and disgraced. In the meantime, his country was in danger. 

Failing to heed Chu Yuan's advice, the king of Chu foolishly went to a conference with the king of Chin (in Shensi), the most powerful military state in that period; he was held there by the Chin army and died in captivity. His son, the new king, instead of avenging his father's death, made a humiliating peace with his enemy. This, however, did not deter Chin's aggressive designs against Chu, and Chu Yuan, who had started his exile as a result of his political failure, lived long enough to see the capital of his state plundered and ruined by the conquering army of Chin in 278 b.c.

At that time, Chu Yuan was already an old man of over sixty, and the fall of the Chu capital was the last blow to his patriotic hope. He does not seem to have long survived his disaster, for the next we hear of him is that he had drowned himself in the river Mi-lo.

Tradition says that his death occurred on the fifth day of the fifth moon (month). Ever since, the day is celebrated in China as the Day of Dragon Boat Festival to commemorate his drowning.