It's Monday, it's cloudy and cool, the cold I fought off all weekend is now trying to kill me, Wall Street is crumbling, Uggs are still in style, yet all is warm, bright and good for Living Root WON IN HARTFORD!!!!! After many long years of trying, after months and months of training our hard work finally paid off when our team won the A Division Final with a time of 2:22. It is a glorious victory never to be forgotten, but it did not come easy.

Living Root's Boat 2 started off the day with a bang--from the port quarter. Early on in their first heat of the day, Boat 2 got broadsided by a cross-eyed community team and nearly capsized. Everyone stayed focused. Those who could continued to paddle, and the boat quickly righted itself and they tore down the course winning the heat and securing a spot in A Division with the sixth fastest time. Boat 2 soon found itself racing against the River Rats in the A Division Semi-Final and they ultimately placed third in the A Division Consolation Final, racing against strong teams from DBCB and Splashing Tiger, Soaking Dragon. It is a great credit to every single paddler on this team that BOTH of our boats finished in the A Division - nice!

In a strange repeat of our 2007 performance, the Charles River Rats began the day by paddling at somewhere between 900 and 1,000 strokes per minute. Although they managed to easily win their heat, everyone was very disappointed with the team's performance (2:34 insert dry-heave sound here). They talked, they identified the problems, and by the Sword of Teamwork and the Hammer of Not Bickering, they shaved 4 seconds off that time in their Semi-Final heat. Lining up for the Final, they found themselves matched with Dragon Docs and Women in Canoe (or a dragon boat). The River Rats nailed the start, and stayed ahead. WIC dropped astern early on, but the Dragon Docs refused to yield, pulling a power 20 halfway through the race. The Rats held steady and everyone gave 100%. They pushed hard all the way through with no drop in power. It was close in the end, but the final times were Living Root - River Rats: 2:22, Dragon Docs: 2:24, and WIC: 2:30.

Everyone contributed to this victory. I would like to thank all the people who drove and hauled food, equipment, and people down to Hartford. Many thanks go out to David Liu and Richard Brickman for setting up an amazing dinner at Lena's. I would like to thank our steerers and drummers: Richard, Whitney, Scott and Lynn from OSD. Thanks to Keith O'Connor who kept Boat 2 in line, motivated and race-ready all day long. I would like to thank the Ocean State Dragons for happily sending us paddlers to fill up Boat 2. Thanks to everyone who paddled for OSD. Thanks to Brian Caldwell for setting up transportation and thanks goes to Rachel for organizing all the food. A huge shout out goes to Nancy for buying an enormous, half-eaten cake from the party next door when their hostess died and the party ended (it's a long story).

To many it would seem like the perfect ending to the season, but wait...there's more. Our next race is Philly, and based on a quick peek at last year's results, we have a pretty good chance of getting into A Division. How is this possible? I don't know. There will be 152 teams there, but last year, the fastest time was a 2:15, and the third place time was a 2:17. We pulled a 2:17 in Montreal, and I know we can pull a 2:15 because that's what the voices keep telling me.

We are making a name for ourselves. We scared the poo out of the competition in Boston, we beat the poutine out of the Canadians in Montreal, we paddled through dead fish and a hurricane to win in RI, and now we've cleaned house in Hartford. Let's go to Philly and make them remember our name. It's time to teach a new generation to fear the sea of black shirts, to fear the flood of the black tide.

Great job in Hartford. Get ready to do it again. You guys rock!!!
-Captain P

We laid waste to the competition yesterday. It took us a few heats to get used to the crazy boats and equipment. Our flag grabbers also needed some time to learn their trade, and our steerers needed time to remember how to steer those dragon barges. But all our hard work made a difference. At the conclusion of the morning time trials, Boat 2 had the fastest time on the course with a 1:31.

The finals were intense. Boat 1 was seeded in C Division and pitted against two honorable but undisciplined teams. They spent about 20 minutes at the start line waiting for the other teams to get lined up, then waiting for the flags to be reset, then waiting for the other teams to line up, but they never lost their focus. Boat 1 was quiet as a morgue, while the crews of the competition were bickering, arguing, and slapping feebly at the water in an attempt to park their boats on the starting line. In exasperation, a competitor looked at us and yelled out, "Why don't we just tell them that they won?" Finally, the horn sounded, and Boat 1 tore down the most disgusting stretch of water known to man and set the fastest time of the day: 1:15. That time remained unbeaten by any team thereafter. Boat 1 won C Division and received $1,000 in prize money.

Boat 2 made it to the A Division finals--a Living Root first! It was a tough race, and they managed to beat Boston Fusion (a Harvard/Liaison/DBCB mix). They came in behind DBCB to win second place in the festival.

Every single member of Living Root contributed mightily to our success. Special thanks goes out to our cook Evan, our food coordinator Margo, transportation guru Nancy, flag grabbers Debbie and Karla, drummers Kristen and Nancy, and our steerers Evan and Scott. A big shout out to all the people who drove through Hanna to get the team on station, and thanks goes out to all those who pulled double duty to keep 2 boats fully loaded for each race. We did really well, and I'm really, really proud of everyone.

Get some rest, take about 4 showers, and I'll see you at practice.
-Dave

This year at Montreal proved to be an excellent one. Living Root broke down several barriers and set some new records including our fastest time: 2:17.06 !! We also brought home the gold in Intermediate Division G 500 meter final with a winning time of 2:18.15.

The 500 meter final was a really hard fought race, and everyone gave everything they had to win. Our start was really solid and the timing was robotic. I was hoping we'd break out of the pack, but the other 5 boats in our heat just stayed right with us. Our drummer, Nila, just kept updating everyone by screaming "Head to head! Head to head!" The power dropped once about midway down the course, but we picked it back up once I screamed at everyone (sorry, I had to). We slammed away at the finish and everyone poured it on thick. The boat was flying along like mad. As we crossed the line there was no way to tell who won. It was too close to call. In the final analysis, we beat the BoozAllen Beta Fish by .01 for the win! To win such a tight race requires a great deal of mental focus, and we're proud of everyone on the team for that one.

We accomplished much and we've continued to make progress. In 2006, we came home empty handed. In 2007 we placed 2nd in Rookie Division C, and now in 2008 we leaped over the rest of the Rookie divisions and won Intermediate Division G. On top of all this, we pulled our fastest time to date during the second time trial: 2:17.06. We just keep getting better and better. I was extremely proud of our performance, and I'm really glad we beat Bananaship.

~Captain Dave P.

Living Root Dragon Boat has been featured recently on the US News section of The Christian Science Monitor, an international daily newspaper.

Click this link to read the full article.

Living Root brought 4 crews to the Boston Dragon Boat race this past Saturday and Sunday, June 7-8, 2008. We had Maverick, Iceman and Goose as our adult teams, and Pathways to China represented our high school entry.

All 4 teams did extremely well! Pathways won its first heat with a 3:09:47, and then several Pathways members got to race with MAD 2 - nice! In their final race of the day, Pathways shaved 6 seconds off its earlier time and finished with a 3:03:86.

Maverick won its semi-final race handily, a full 2 seconds ahead of Harvard Pilgrim. Then, they placed 2nd in the C Division Major Finals with a scorching time of 2:43:03, narrowly defeating the Harvard Pilgrim Health Care team again by only .40 seconds.

Iceman placed 2nd in the B Division Minor Finals with a 2:34:33, a mere .20 seconds away from 1st place! Had they not had to deal with broken paddle handles in their semi-final heat, we have no doubt they would have been in the B Major Finals. Frustrating to be sure, but they actually pulled a whole second faster with broken paddles than in their first race of the day. Go figure...

Goose finished 2nd in its A Division Semi-Final heat, with a team record of 2:21:72. Goose went on to race in the A Division Major finals--a first for LRDB--and raced against a strong Montreal mixed team, MAD 1, and DBCB's Drachenfurie. We came in 4th, but it felt great to be in the race all the way to the end. Our engines are fired and ready to go for Montreal, where we will see all 3 of these teams again...

Great job Living Root! Great balls of fire!