Dragon Boat - Comparison With Canoes and Row-boats

Comparison With Canoes and Row-boats

A dragon boat is very similar to a canoe, as both are paddle-craft rather than a rowing-craft, and crew members paddle rather than "row". Canoe and dragonboat paddlers sit, crouch or stand facing forward in the direction of travel, i.e. facing the prow (front) of the boat, whereas rowers sit or sometimes stand, generally facing aft or backwards. The paddles are not connected or attached mechanically to the hull of the boat, whereas the oars and sweeps manned by rowers are joined to their shells by a kind of hinged joint. which acts as a pivot point and allows for mechanical advantage. People who paddle dragon boats may also compete in other types of larger craft such as in outrigger canoe racing due to some similarities in training regimes and sporting ethos. But all have evolved into different, distinctive sports, with Outrigger racing, War Canoe racing. and Dragonboating having significant cultural, ceremonial and religious aspects inherent to competition, whereas many of these aspects are absent in canoe and kayak racing. But similarities occur as all canoes dragons and outriggers were used as working boats which can be still seen in open canoe touring today

Canoes are derived from hollowed out tree trunks (either single log, or single log supported by one or a pair of outrigged float pontoons or else catamaran style double logs.); or from birch and other deciduous tree bark shells stretched over wooden frames. Traditional wooden dragon boats, however, derive from rafts of three lashed-together timber beams, similar to the long and slender bamboo rafts consisting of lashed bundles of hollow bamboo stalks which can still be seen in China today. The center beam acts as the keel with another beam attached on each side of it acting like a pair of sponsons for stability, preventing the center beam from otherwise rolling. It is the three lashed, rafted beams of old that give the Hong Kong style of dragon boats its characteristic hull form cross section underwater seen today, which is like the shape of the letter "W". Which can be derived from the canoe form of two.hollowed logs lashed together. If onelooks at the Hong Kong boats brought to Britain are made out of 4 planks in the w shape as mentioned earlir and topped with another plank on each side to give more freeboard. This unique design feature is a vestigal throwback to earlier primitive lashed-log raft forms on which modern hulls are based. Traditional wooden boats are slender and heavy, typically weighing in at approximately 1,750 pounds for a 22-person hull. As the sport of dragon boating has increased in popularity and spread to countries outside of Asia, many countries have switched to using dragon boats constructed of fibreglass and plastic resin, which are significantly lighter. In Britain the dragon boats were initially made in two pieces for transport and bolted together at competition site with many bolts. the first one piece boats boats were made on the Isle of Wight for Dragon Boat Events

In 2006, the executive committee of the Sport Accord, formerly known as the General Association of International Sport Federations GAISF, accepted the application of the International Dragon Boat Federation IDBF as the sole world sporting federation which organises and recognises the majority of the world's dragon boat crews, now from more than 70 countries, and that convenes the world championships for this paddling sport. At the 2008 Sport Accord congress convened in Beijing, the majority of the membership (that is, the federations of other world sports, some of which are also members of the International Olympic Committee IOC) voted to ratify the decision of the executive committee in recognising the IDBF as representing a paddle sport which is separate from other paddle sports such as kayaking, canoeing and outrigger canoeing. The IDBF being elected into membership of the GAISF by the majority of the world's sport federations already in membership of the GAISF paves the way for the IDBF to seek membership in the IOC separate from the world federation for canoe racing. IDBF's membership application had been previously blocked by the GAISF member representing canoe and kayak racing, an international sporting association that originated early in the 20th century following the development of canoe sport in the late 19th century and which claimed to automatically control the boat races which have existed for over two thousand years prior, despite not having organised any competitions or promoted the activity until only very recently and some 30 years after the international modern sport was already being organised and promoted by dragon boat specialists with the assistance of the rowing fraternity.