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And still a little more from the WonderBroads, Canada

Even COVID can’t stop the WonderBroads from paddling!As Spring 2021 rounded the corner, the WonderBroads were as excited as ever to be on the water; however, masks and social distancing played havoc with plans. Being a committed and creative group though, a solution was soon found - kayaking!Kayaking as a team was full of challenges and firsts. Not only did we need to learn the skills of gracefully getting in and out of a rocky kayak, but we also needed to be creative in developing drills that...

Argentina Update

Each year the Argentinian teams try to get together to share paddling experiences and camaraderie. The 4th National Rosas meeting is being planned for February 2022. The final date is yet to be determined.It will be known as “Chocon Rosa 2022”It is planned to have paddling activities, coaching clinics, water safety drills, awareness talks on the early detection of breast cancer and above all 4 days of fun and enjoyment.The previous Rosas meetings were:Neuquen, November 2017El Cochon, Neuquen...

Book: Internationally Abreast by Michelle Hanton & Eleanor Neilson

What an incredible journey it has been over the past 25 years since breast cancer dragon boating began in Vancouver, Canada in 1996. Dr Don McKenzie’s belief that breast cancer survivors SHOULD participate in vigorous upper body exercise threw conventional medical thinking on its ear and look where we are now.You can read about this amazing adventure in the book written by Michelle Hanton and Eleanor Nielson. This is a documented history from then till now, focusing primarily on the beginnings...

Breast Cancer Paddler Organisations

We always encourage the teams in any country to become a group, more power in a larger voice and at the very least, have representation on their regional and national associations/federations.Dragons Abreast AustraliaRemadoras Rosa BrazilArgentina in RosaNZDBA BC representativeDragon Boat Canada BC representativeUSDBF BC representativeThese are some of the organisations that we know about that represent breast-cancer paddlers not just at the team level but at a higher level. We strongly encourag...

Breast Cancer Survivors Find Strength

Sisterhood on Dragon BoatBy Susan Parrish for The ColumbianPaddlers find and create community on a team that practices at Vancouver Lake.When Tammy Michelson climbed onto a dragon boat for her first-ever race, she knew she was prepared.She had been practicing three times a week for a few months with her team, Catch-22, on Vancouver Lake. Despite describing herself as “not athletic” nor a joiner of sports teams, here she was poised on the narrow bench of a dragon boat, gripping her paddle and...

Dragon Dream Team, Akron, Ohio

Hits the airwaves on Good Morning AmericaTuesday, October 5, the US National television show Good Morning America featured one of the IBCPC teams from Akron, Ohio - Dragon Dream Team!The long segment was aired in celebration of the breast cancer month of October and showed this wonderful team of 88 women on and off the water. It was a beautiful and inspiring piece and we have attached the link below....

From Claire Fiaschi - On The Loire River Paddle

Article from Claire Fiaschi, our French National Representative on the Loire River paddle.De l'Allier à la Loire, United Ladies 2021United ladies 2021 is the challenge taken up by 31 paddlers from 5 to 8 August. This superb collective experience, which combines surpassing oneself, group cohesion and immersion in the heart of nature, took the paddlers from Vichy to La Charité sur Loire.It is impossible to paddle in dragon boats, as they are too rigid and fragile for the sandbanks of the Allier ...

From the WonderBroads, Canada

This year's CIBC Run for the Cure brought us together virtually and the feeling of community was stronger than ever as thousands of Canadians across the country united in support of the breast cancer cause. Over $9 million was raised Canada-wide for Canadians impacted by breast cancer!The WonderBroads of Windsor Essex participated in this year’s CIBC Run for the Cure. Our team earmarked their fundraising to go to Metastatic Breast Cancer research.A number of our teammates gathered to walk toge...

Letter from the President

December 2021It is hard to believe that we are already in December, where has the year gone. It has been one filled with so many challenges for so many of you in terms of how your country managed COVID and whether you were able to get out on the water. I wonder what 2022 will bring us as more countries start to open up and travel becomes a reality, albeit in a very different way to what we have previously experienced.Christmas will soon be with us and it will be an opportunity (hopefully) for yo...

News from Austria and Germany

by Svenja Franke-Bruhn, Country Liaison Austria and National representative GermanyVienna Pink Dragons, AustriaThe Vienna Pink Dragons enjoyed a busy sunny summer not only with regularly training on the Alte Donau and a number of full moon paddles, but also a fun Muddy Dragon Day held at the club including many games and of course good food to share. We all thoroughly enjoyed these get-togethers, especially after the difficulties of the last year and the many COVID restrictions....

Paddling with Hope: Strength and Sisterhood in a Dragon Boat

We started our 15th year in 2021 thinking we would not be able to get back in the boats for the second year in a row due to COVID. Yet, we ended the paddling season, 88 members strong, with an awesome opportunity to kick-off Breast Cancer Awareness Month with breast cancer survivors and fellow dragon boat paddlers across the nation.Our team, The Dragon Dream Team of Akron, Ohio is so proud and honored to have represented these two communities in a Good Morning America (GMA) segment on October 5,...

Profile from Tarshia Boutte, USA National Representative

Native Houstonian and invasive ductile carcinoma survivor, Tarshia Boutte, is the team captain of Texas’ first breast cancer survivor dragon boat team, Pink Phurree . At 5’11” tall, Tarshia was built for the engine room. You can often hear her voice from the shoreline as she motivates her Pink Phurree crew mates to the finish line. Off the water, Tarshia works as a corporate trainer, leads a water exercise class at her gym, serves in her church’s children’s ministry, and loves to embar...

The Cancer Journey

Judy Via Cava is a member of the Machestic Dragons, Princeton, New Jersey, USA. She is also a Cancer coach. What may you ask is that???? Well, we suggest you check out the website: www.thecancerjourney.com.The Cancer Journey coaches intend to have some very special sessions for our paddlers at the 2023 festival but, in the interim, if you would like to check out what they do and you may be interested in becoming a coach then we suggest you join the free class, "A Taste of Cancer Journey Coaching...

Vaccine Policy Statement from the IBCPC Medical Adivsory Panel (MAP)

The Medical Advisory Panel (MAP) of the IBCPC strongly encourages breast cancer survivor dragon boat teams to create their own individual vaccine policies. These policies should be in accordance with your local public health guidelines and any national dragon boat guidelines that may exist. Links to national/regional dragon boat vaccine policies can be found below.Any policy created should include clear expectations for individual members of a team both on and off the water and for both indoor a...

We're Back Baby And Stronger Than Ever

The Southeast USA is really shining post COVID! Looking through some 2021 pictures, we can easily recap the year with smiles.In the first quarter of 2021 we were keeping our distance but building strength however possible. Kayaking, SUPs, and OCs were becoming the norm for our water sport activities. (pic 1). But by April, the Jacksonville Mammoglams brought back our laughs sharing sisterhood with some Survivors in Sync friends at our festival in Inverness, Florida (2).As we continued to become ...

Para Dragons - building inclusion

Meri Gibson, President IBCPC, met with Nigel Bedford, Chair IDBF Para Athletes Commission over a video call (aided by the trifling matter of some 19,000km between Christchurch, New Zealand and London, England!).First of all, tell us a bit about the Para Athletes Commission and how it fits in with other IDBF activities.The IDBF Para Athletes Commission (IDBF-PAC) replaced the Adaptive Paddlers Commission in 2017. IDBF wanted the Commission’s name and terms of reference to reflect better both it...

Barbara's Story

Barbara's StoryBarbara Montiero is a member of the Canomama team from Brazil. She is a black belt in marital arts and has a lovely story to share.The first paragraph is part of the repost of an article by @sorriremamar.“We live in a world dominated by a weaning culture, full of “subtle influences” and foundations without any scientific foundation that undermined the safety of mothers and condemn babies to weaning, sometimes before birth”.Barbara’s StoryBut I’m going to talk from the ...

Cancellation - 15th IDBF World Dragon Boat Racing Championships

Hong KongThe IDBF Council convened a meeting on Saturday, 24 July 2021 to consider the ongoing implications of COVID-19 on our Championships.In that meeting, the IDBF Council decided that:The 15th IDBF World Dragon Boat Racing Championships (WDBRC), to be held in November 2021 in Hong Kong, China is officially cancelled. The Hong Kong Organising Committee (HKOC) were also in total agreement with the cancellation of the ChampionshipsThe safety and welfare of athletes and everyone involved was par...

From one side of the world to the other

We absolutely love this story below from Edith Cooper, Brisbane, Australia. Edith holds a special place in the heart of our President as it was Edith who at the festival in Caloundra, Australia, 2007 encouraged Meri to pursue a dragon boat career and to follow her heart and goals within the sport. They have stayed close friends over the years, and even though they live in different countries they really enjoy meeting up at any chance they can.Edith’s story of hope and philanthropyBrisbane host...

IBCPC and Betty Solley thank Cheryl Lychwick

Cheryl Lychwick has been a dedicated worker as an IBCPC National Representative representing the Midwestern region of the United States.We bid farewell to Cheryl as she retires from some of her many responsibilities in the dragon boat world. As a National Representative for the past seven years since the Peterborough festival, Cheryl has kept in excellent communication with her Midwestern US teams and the IBCPC, publishing an annual Newsletter and responding to the many questions posed by our te...

Letter from the President

September 2021Greetings to you all (Kia Ora Koutou)In late June we celebrated National Volunteers Week and here at IBCPC we’re celebrating the amazing work of volunteers across our networks around the globe.We have no idea how large the number of total volunteers in all walks of life is across the globe, but we all agree it would be in the many millions. We do know the numbers for New Zealand (a small island nation of 5,000,000). The most recent statistics show that more than 200,000 New Zeala...

LIPs Sisters are on to their next adventure

With the cancellation of the Linked in Pinks (LIPs) trip to Niagara Falls for the Welland Ontario Hope Floats event in August their next LIPs adventure is the Miami Dragon Boat Festival to be held on November 20, 2021, at 3501 Rickenbacker Causeway, Key Biscayne, Florida, USA.As with each LIPs event it will be not only be a day of racing, but with the collaboration of LIP sisters, Coach Kim and President Victoria of the host team Save Our Sisters, they will expand the fun to Thursday and Friday ...

Male BCS the word is spreading

When we ran our newsletter article about Mark O’Connor being our Male BCS Ambassador the response was overwhelming. So many positive comments about the fact we had made this appointment and the selection of the man to represent other male BCS. One of those comments came from the Male Breast Cancer Coalition. Who even knew that this existed? Below is an extract from their Facebook page.The Male Breast Cancer Coalition (MBCC)The male breast cancer coalition (MBCC) a global not-for-profit patient...

More Power to Women

Whilst IBCPC is not in any way a political forum, we found it interesting to follow this summit and in particular the policies that they felt were of importance to woman globally. It rang bells with us in terms of moving forward or in their words “building forward”, as that is what we endeavour to do at IBCPC, to build to grow. Below are some excerpts from the press release.Women Political Leaders Summit 2021Press release: Heads of States, Ministers, Speakers of Parliaments, Parliamentarians...

New Country Enquiries

Mexico and TrinidadWe are currently in discussions now and will look to undertake outreach clinics in late 2022/early mid-2023 in these two countries.Betty Solley, IBCPC Membership Director connected Mariana Lascano of Los Mochis, Sinaloa, Mexico with the members of Pink Phuree, Houston, Texas. Mariana had contacted the IBCPC to request information about starting a breast cancer paddling team in Mexico. She is President of a nonprofit organization in Los Mochis, and while her group currently has...