BDA Exeter 2010
Round 5 "Eclectic - Made up of or combining elements from a variety of sources"
(By Jim 'International Athlete' Joannou)
It's seems appropriate, given that it's located on a horse racing course, that racing at Worcester is a complete lottery. It might be one of the most picturesque locations we frequent each year and it definitely has a 'good vibe' about it with everyone seemingly in a good mood (even Binh smiled a couple of times...gasp!!)....helped, no doubt, by the sunny weather and the ladies selling tea and bacon butties at knock down prices...but in terms of a sporting event attended by International Athletes (CLANG...!!!), it leaves a little to be desired.
There is clearly a certain skill involved in lining up three dragonboats on a fast moving river so that they are all equally placed for the start...and, alas, it is not one possessed by the two spotty youths tasked with the chore on Sunday. Betweem them and our helm, Five Second Eddy (oh, yes...he picked up another one...collecting them like a MacDonald's employee collects gold stars...one more and he'll be employee of the month !!) repeatedly timing our arrival just in time to have us take one stroke backwards as they simultaneously did the 'Down and Ready, Attention, Go' bit, meant we gave the other crews a 3 metre head start in each race. Funnily enough, we didn't win many...errmm, ANY !! No, no...I'm wrong. We did scrape a win against Secklow and some randoms (Cool Runnings...?? What's so cool about coming last every time ???) in the first 200m race, but that was it...Not enough for an International Athlete (CLANG....!!!) to be shouting about from the rooftops, I think you'll agree !!
Giving away a 3 metre head start in any 200m race is a bad move. When you're up against Batchworth in a semi, it's fatal. We did beat Tao, which contained some of my fellow International Athletes (CLANG...!!!) so that was a sweet feeling (thanks for that one, guys...) but with the 5 second penalty Eddy picked up all by himself (!!), it meant we were out of both Finals in the 200m and in the Tail race so Binh decided to conduct an experiment. For some bizarre reason, known only to himself, he had us change our usual, highly succesful, race pattern into some hair brained 'Let's just sprint it all the way...' mumbo jumbo of a race plan. Clueless! Any fool could have told him that was never going to work. I've no idea where he dreams this stuff up and it was no surprise to this particular International Athlete (CLANG...!!!) that we put in a 2 second slower time than before. Hopefully, he has got it out of his system and we can all move on...especially as it handed a win to arch-rivals Typhoon Tigers (is that vendetta still going in FiSeE's (pronounced: Fizzy's) head...???) !! and Tao brought the score level at 1 - 1.
After refuelling at half-time....as an Interntaional Athlete (CLANG...!!!) I personally chose a double cheeseburger from the lovely Worcester ladies: Two all beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions on a sesame seed bun...only without the special sauce, lettuce, pickles, a plain bun plus an extra 50p for the second pattie....and I'm not sure about the ALL beef pattie bit either (I'll never complain about THAT burger chain again...) we were on for the 500m races.
Perhaps it was the extra weight of the cheeseburgers (it wasn't just me that had one...!!) or the fact that paddling in Lane 1 felt like trying to move the boat through wet concrete even to an International Athlete (CLANG...!!!) like me, but Hurricanes beat us by almost a second. As it happens, that gave us more of a chance as they went on to face Amathus in the semi whilst we had Kingston to deal with. With us drawn in Lane 3, we at least stood a chance in a fair fight but as I watched them drift lazily down the river whilst we were stationary 3 metres back when the starter called 'Go', hope began to fade. Try as we might, we were never going to claw that difference back and with Execalibre taking a leaf out of 'Fizzy's Guide to Superlative Helming' (he'll be signing copies at BDA London...) and hitching a tow from Kingston to finish second, we were in another tail race....Twice in one day !!!
The good news is that the Tail race takes place half an hour before the Major Cup Final and with rumours circulating that the KFC on the M42 was running low on chicken, we were keen to head off. As we headed to the boat and Sue Menzies took the opportunity to have a dig at poor defenceless little Fizzy about keeping in his own lane, I lept to his aid by accusing her of favouritism to Execalibre as she hadn't pinged them with a 5 second penalty when they had clearly lane infringed. I should know, I am an International Athlete (CLANG...!!!) after all. After she had patiently explained that the red flag she was waving at the end of that race was to allow our helm to protest if he wanted to, Fizzy and I slunk off with our tails between our legs and a far clearer understanding of the rules of dragonboating!
But that brought up Tao and Pershore. A decider against Tao and a guaranteed win against Pershore, surely. Drawn in lane 2, we would struggle to lose this one, for sure. Sigh...Sometimes it's just not your day, huh! It was a cracking race for all concerned with Kitty, unprepared to wait for the KFC, fishing a dead bird in to the boat as an appetiser....errmm, the idea is to leave the water outside the boat...but the glory and the boasting rights went to Tao, making it 2 -1 on the day and with Pershore putting us in 3rd place (again...!!), we knew it was time to get the hell out of Dodge.
Some emergency surgery on Martin to remove a splinter (girl...!!) interrupted our departure but after he refused to let me cut him with my improvised scalpel (what could possibly go wrong with an unsterilised Swiss Army knife...??) I lost interest and we headed out. I'm pleased to say that the rumours were unfounded and the KFC had plenty of chicken left....at least it did when we arrived, not so sure by the time we left...burp!
As we passed Oxford on the way back down the M42, the heavens opened and it had clearly been bucketing down in London all day whilst we had bathed all day in the beautiful sunshine of Worcester and had a great day as a team....so perhaps there is a life lesson here that there are more important things to dragonboating than perfect race starts and still, deep water...Perhaps!
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