Brandenburg, Germany
July 14 – 20, 2025
Submitted by Linda Kuska.
Look at how far the Breast Cancer Paddler (BCP) Division has come since it started 30 years ago in Vancouver! When I started dragon boating in 1999, we were widely accepted in community festivals but now BCP teams and paddlers can be whatever they want to be and be accepted in all levels of competition.
On December 21, 2024, IDBF sent out Bulletin 1 in preparation for the 17th IDBF World Dragon Boat Racing Championships in Brandenburg, Germany and BCP was on there! By the end of January, excitement and questions were happening around the World with countries preparing for the addition of the BCP division!
Could they get competitive teams together in just 5 to 6 months? Pick Coaches, develop a program, get the information out to the teams and paddlers, have try camps in different locations, do fitness testing, get all the paperwork completed and submitted and select the crew. Well, sometimes it is best not to think and just do and it obviously worked because there certainly was competition on the water in Germany in the BCP division!!
From my perspective, having been BCP paddler for 26 years, I just had to be part of this inaugural event. I have competed in many National Championships, Pan Am, CanAM, many Club Crew World Championships all in the BCP division and I always dreamed but never thought that the World Championships would be a possibility for the BCP division. I just had to wear CANADA on my back!
But Meri Gibson has been pushing for this for years and this time with the help of Claudio Schermi, President of IBDF, a vote occurred to include the BCP division, and it passed!!
For Team Canada, Cheryl McLachlan (Coach of Rowbust) was named Head Coach and Kamini Jain (Coach of False Creek) was named Assistant Coach.
By the end of January 2025, a note was sent out to all BCP teams in Canada, then it was a crazy few weeks to put together a Fitness testing program, try out camps dates and book accommodations for a team that wasn’t going to be named until May 15th, which was only 8 weeks before racing started!
February to May was really just a blur, everything happened so fast with working out, training with our home team, eating correctly, paperwork that needed to be completed, fitness testing, tryout camps and oh ya.......work and life!! But was it worth it in the end!
In Canada, we had 2 Try Out Camps, one in Vancouver and one in Ontario. We had 68 breast cancer paddlers trying out for 38 spots since we were taking a Standard boat and Small boat. This along with the Fitness Testing that we submitted made the Coaches job hard to pick a crew of 38 since many strong paddlers tried out and on May 15th the crew was notified, and Team Canada BCP was named.
Since the team was spread across Canada, we didn’t get together as a team until we were all together in Germany on July 9th. We had 3 full days of training in Germany where the crews were put together and then 2 training sessions at the race site. Team Canada BCP gelled and felt strong.
I’m sure other countries did basically the same process since it was such a short timeline to get the crews named and together. So good for you for being part of this inaugural event for our division!
BCP Standard Boat Countries:
Canada
France
Germany
Great Britain
Italy
New Zealand
Spain
USA
BCP Small Boat Countries:
Canada
Germany
Italy
Malaysia
Serbia
Sweden
USA
Thank you to Svenja Franke Bruhn and Christina Bremer for helping me find a training facility in Germany that we could train a few days before the race site training times started. This site was absolutely perfect for us and who wouldn’t want to train on the site that held the 1936 Summer Olympics!! If you have read or watched The Boys in the Boat, you will understand where we did our training.......priceless!!
The race site in Brandenburg, Germany was a 1st class facility. I have been to many Club Crew World Championships, but this was totally different. Being in the Athlete Tent with all of Team Canada was a surreal experience. To have different countries beside you all in their team jerseys with their countries on their backs.......WOW!
The weather wasn’t exactly how we expected it, we were expecting a heat wave since most of Europe was going through that, but not Germany, at least not while we were there. We used our raincoats a lot, we were wet a lot, we were cold and thank goodness the vendors had sweatshirts for sale 😊. It did warm up by the end of the racing week and honestly, i wouldn’t change a thing!
The Standard boat category raced 2000 m, 1000 m, 200 m and 500 m.
The Small boat category raced 2000 m, 200 m and 500 m.
If you have been following any of the posts on social media, you will have seen how close the races were. Races were won by fraction of a second, races were so close that no one knew who won until it was posted. That is exactly what we were looking for and that is exactly what the crowds LOVED.
The roar of the crowds when you got close to the grandstands were amazing, they energized us in the boats.
When you have IDBF Officials and Athletes approach you and tell you that it’s about time that the BCP division was added.......that was priceless.
When the BCP teams were on the podium receiving their medals, the crowd erupted in cheers and was the loudest of all of the medal presentations. When the BCP teams were on the podium, the crowd erupted with “BCP, BCP, BCP”......... how can you top that?
When you are on the podium, after you have had your medal placed around your neck and had your hug from Meri Gibson, you turned to the Flags and the Gold Medal team had their National Anthem played........if you weren’t crying before that, you certainly were once the crowd was singing (in our case) Oh Canada!! WOW.....that is exactly the experience I wanted! And it was an even better experience than I ever could have imagined.
Thank you to the IDBF for believing in the BCP division, a HUGE thank you to Meri Gibson for pushing so hard to have the BCP division recognized. I know how much you would have loved to be in that New Zealand boat, but I can’t tell you how much we loved placing those medals around our necks!
Finally, THANK YOU to all the countries who entered a BCP crew! I KNOW how much work it was and, but we all LOVED it and will always cherish this memory.
Competitors on the water and friends for life off the water.........We did it ladies and it will only grow bigger from here!!
What an exciting ride it was, and I look forward to the future of BCP dragon boating that includes all levels of paddling no matter what your need is.
Linda Kuska
Team Canada BCP Paddler
IBCPC Membership Director
