Dragon boat festival expected to bring revenue to valley
Twenty-two people sat in rows of two from head to tail, with one person manning the front and one at the back of the 46-foot long dragon boat that pushed off from Flathead Lake Lodge’s boat dock for a practice run on the lake Thursday morning.
It was one of the Whitefish Credit Union’s teams that took the plunge during the dragon boat demonstration day in anticipation of the first Montana Dragon Boat Festival hosted at the Flathead Lake Lodge on Sept. 8.
“For us, we’re looking at visitation, we want something that will drive visitation into the valley,” said Rob Brisendine of the Kalispell Convention and Visitors Bureau.
The bureau is spearheading the event in conjunction with Dynamic Dragon Boat Racing LLC, who is involved with creating dragon boat races across the nation.
The credit union has two teams entered into the event which has a total of 54 teams racing. Montana has 39 teams signed up for the event, five teams are from out-of-state and 10 teams are coming from Canada.
With 54 22-person teams and a spectator crowd anticipated to be around 2,200 people, the visitors bureau expects the event to bring an extra $476,000 into the Flathead.
“This is an off-season event, after our tourist season,” said Janet Clark from the Kalispell Grand Hotel and the visitors bureau. “With such an enthusiastic response in our first year, we will only see it grow.”
Brisendine said it’s the eighth fastest growing sport in the world, and that’s part of the reason the visitors bureau thought to bring it to the Flathead. With all the canoeing, rafting, boating, and paddleboarding people in the Flathead already participate in, Brisendine said dragon boating seemed like it would be a natural fit.
“I knew the potential here,” Brisendine said. “It’s such an active community.”
The visitors bureau partnered up with a dragon boat festival in Lethbridge that is in it’s sixth year. Nine of the Canadian teams are from the Lethbridge festival, which took place July 6-8, and this year the Kalispell visitors bureau sent a team to participate.
“They were so excited when a team from Montana entered,” said Donna Townsley, an economist at the University of Lethbridge.
Townsley helped bridge the gap between Canada and Kalispell.
Doug Coats, an avid canoer, was on the team from Kalispell that participated in the Lethbridge races. He helped the Whitefish Credit Union team during their practice run on Thursday.
“Really accentuate the downward motion of the paddle into the water with your body and then use your legs and torso to pull it through the water and up,” Coats told them before they took to the water.
It didn’t look easy.
Coats is racing for the Lion’s Club team in the Montana Dragon Boat Festival. Jo Scott is also racing with the Lion’s Club team and traveled to Lethbridge with the visitors bureau team.
She said dragon boat racing is all about taking the cues from the person in front of you and paddling together. They participated in four 500-meter races and took second in their division.
“You’re trying so hard to remember the things you’ve been taught,” Scott said. “It’s a real rush.”
The Snappy’s Sports boat is one of two in the Flathead. The visitors bureau will be holding practice runs for teams interested in participating at the beach in Somers. For a schedule of practice days and times or to learn more about the festival visit www.mtdragonboat.com.