Dragon boat races in Busse Woods' South Pool: Watch this cool drone footage
Dragon boat racing has been part of Chinese culture for 2,500 years and a fun way to spend a Saturday in the Northwest suburbs for the past seven.
Racers and representatives of the Chicago International Dragon Boat Festival's charity of choice, Adaptive Adventures, gave the event's new venue at Busse Woods' South Pool near Elk Grove Village a thumbs-up after construction this year forced a move from Lake Arlington in Arlington Heights.
Tina Selga, owner of the business My Sweet Kake in her hometown of Schaumburg, is in her second year as a member of the local racing team 21 Dragons. She said the Busse Woods location allowed the teams to camp closer to the water and was better just for the ease of parking alone.
Even though Adaptive Adventures in Elk Grove Village got the full share of the proceeds from paid parking that existed only at Lake Arlington, Chicago Program Director Greg Zbrzezny of Bartlett said he still found Busse Woods better as well.
This year the charity is instead receiving a cut from each racing team's registration fee to help provide opportunities for children, adults and veterans with physical disabilities to take part in such activities as climbing, cycling, sailing and scuba diving. Its members even have a dragon boat team of their own.
Matthew Boyle, director of events for Toronto-based GWN Dragon Boat, said the feedback from participants would play a role in deciding on next year's venue. The criteria has always been a relatively small body of water long enough to hold both 200-meter and 500-meter races with up to four dragon boats per heat.
This year's event saw it grow to 35 teams and just over 1,000 participants for the first time, Boyle said. The Northwest suburbs were added to GWN Dragon Boat's U.S. events in 2012 after local participants who traveled to other cities suggested the move.
Selga and her team's captain, Edsel Gonzales of Bartlett, said their own interest is in just this once-a-year event. But 21 Dragons has claimed the trophy in the mixed open division in three previous years, Gonzales said.
The team includes members who are bankers, nurses and IT professionals as well as teenage boys and girls. Most of them met through a running club.
"I think a lot of us thought about doing something new," Gonzales said. "Running can be a solitary sport. Dragon racing is the ultimate team sport!"
In fact, there are 21 members of the team - the basis of its name. While the traveling teams have their own steerers as a 22nd member of the crew, GWN provides the steerers in the local divisions.
Each team was scheduled to race in three heats Saturday. Unlike a running race, the hour or so between heats is enough for the team to fully recover for the 500-meter race, Gonzales said.
One of the first things a new racer learns is that coordination among the members produces better, swifter results than being overly aggressive with one's own rowing, he said.