Ten years Vienna Pink Dragons: A story full of enthusiasm, hope, perseverance and joy.
Submitted by Svenja Franke-Bruhn.
Founding President Vienna Pink Dragons and IBCPC Country Liaison Austria.
When I arrived in Vienna in 2014 with the idea of founding a breast cancer paddling team, I had no clue of what the coming years would bring, full of fun and newfound friends, but equally challenging and demanding a lot of patience and perseverance. Having been diagnosed with advanced breast cancer in New Zealand in 2011 and after embracing dragon boat paddling in Sydney, Australia, as a rehabilitation sport, I thought it would be an easy breeze when I moved to Austria to set up the first pink paddling team in this beautiful country.
Well, things turned out to be a bit different. I had underestimated that dragon boating was not well known at all in Austria. Doctors and nurses were hesitant when they heard about the project, and even the breast cancer survivors themselves were initially not easy to get on board. This required a lot of advocating, advertising, and spreading the word about the benefits of this rehabilitation sport.
We grew slowly but steadily, and so here we are now in 2025, ten years later. The Vienna Pink Dragons had their tenth anniversary in September and could celebrate this with the baptism of our second pink boat. This time it was a standard one, which was purchased with funds raised through a charity auction, called “More – Moments in life”, of artworks that captured moments in the lives of cancer patients.
We are immensely grateful and are now looking proudly at two pink boats for our pink team. The first one is a small boat and named after Nina, my co-founding paddling friend, who passed away in 2018 far too early at age 36 from a different type of cancer. Nina left us the boat as a present to help us with our growing project, and her husband Felix and his new partner Luisa became our trusted trainers.
The new big boat has been named “Frauenzimmer”, which is an ancient expression of imperial Austria/Vienna, where women could meet in a safe space. In a figurative sense, this is what the dragonboat means for us. More on the story and the meaning of this name can be found on our Facebook and Instagram pages. The baptism ceremony was very meaningful, colourful, and emotional, and was followed by a joint paddle out and the traditional flower ceremony.
It would be too much to describe in detail all the events we attended during those ten years. The numerous pink festivals we organized, the joy of attending the IBCPC festivals in Florence and New Zealand, our regular trips to the Vogalonga and the highest dragon boat race at Obersee, Tyrolia, the Muddy Angel Runs and Pinkathlons, to name just a few.
Although being a young team, we have already witnessed too many losses. First Nina, and in the 4th and 5th year our pink paddling sisters Bine and Lidia. This has brought us even closer together as a team, and we are tremendously grateful for the unwavering support of our friends from the Vienna Dragons during times of new challenges. We managed to stay well connected during the COVID years; we grew even closer when we had to look for a new club; we founded Pink Paddling Austria, an association to promote dragon boating as a rehabilitation sport after breast cancer all over Austria. And there is more good news on the horizon: a second team near Linz is now starting to form.
After seven years, I stepped down as president and passed the baton to Julia Glocker. We are very lucky to have Julia now as our president as we continue our mission to raise awareness about breast cancer through the dragon boating platform. Many new and enthusiastic pink paddling sisters joined us lately, and I am delighted that pink paddling is now so firmly established in Austria. Here’s to another decade of enthusiasm, hope, perseverance and joy for the Vienna Pink Dragons!
Photo Credit: Barbara Wirl
