IDBF is the international governing body for the team water sport of dragon boat racing. The IDBF was founded by representatives from Australia, China, Chinese Taipei, Great Britain, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Italy, Malaysia, Norway, Philippines, Singapore and the USA.  

In Australia, due to the Southern Hemisphere seasons, the dragon boating season generally runs between late August to mid April. Around Australia, there are regular regattas held for dragon boat clubs to race each other, as well as annual competitions held for state representative crews to compete. Clubs who outperform others in their state also compete against other state’s top crews at the National Titles. The 2010 Australian National Titles will be held in Adelaide, South Australia.

The IDBF has organized World Nations Dragon Boat Racing Championships (WDBRC) for Representative National or Territorial teams every two years since 1995. In between world championship years, IDBF Club Crew World Championships (CCWC) is held for the world’s top club-based crews.

IDBF Championships

It’s usually a little booklet like this one below:

You can also include body vitals, such as: body weight, body fat %, resting heart rate, girth measurements of waist, chest, legs and arms. These are usually recorded initally at the start of a training programme / season and not at each session. Then at the end of the season, a paddler can look back at their improvements, not just in race times, but in their overall body conditioning.

How to record your data?

A simple way to make sure your data is recorded accurately is to buy an exercise book with lines and draw some columns with headings (you can also type it into a computer on an excel spreadsheet and print it out as well, or even more advanced is to store it on a PDA, whichever way you choose just make sure you can access it easily after every training session). Here’s an example of what I do:

Also a crucial aspect is to be honest with what you do on the water and off the water. Write a brief summary of how you felt after the training session and make sure it’s dated.

Training logs will help you in the long term. If you have a bad racing year, you can look back at previous years logs and find out how hard you trained and felt in previous years. Good paddling years are usually a result of how well you have trained.

If you are like me and would prefer to keep everything electronic on the Internet, here’s a website called iLog that can keep track of your training sessions and results.

Good luck with your training and if you have any additional comments, please write them below.

It’s been a while coming and now is your chance to get a copy of my free report, the Dragon Boat Quickstart.

The Quickstart is a report I put together to help any Dragon Boat paddler equip themselves with the right knowledge and gear.

In the report you will find:

• The terminology most commonly used in Dragon Boating
• How to find the right paddle that fits you
• The 5 essential items to get for Dragon Boating

To get your copy, click here -

http://www.dragonglobe.com/quickstart

Your Feedback Please

I hope this report will be beneficial to you and one of the best rewards for me is when I read your feedback comments about it.

If you have anything to say, good , bad or indifferent, after reading the Dragon Boat Quickstart, please add your comment to this post.

Tyrone Shum

Macronutrients
Macronutrients are the food substances that fuel and repair our body. They are made up of carbohydrates, protein and fat. It is only when these macronutrients are in the correct ratios that a person can have a lean, heathy body, irrespective of their total calorie intake. The macronutrient profile, when combined with food timing, is an excellent way to burn both fat and strengthen your muscles for dragonboating.

Carbohydrates
Carbohydrates (carbs) can be broken into two broad categories, simple and complex. Simple carbs include fructose (fruit sugar), lactose (diary sugar), sucrose (white sugar), maltose (malt sugar) and glucose (blood sugar).

Some experts argue that because fructose (fruit sugar) is ‘healthier’ than sucrose (white sugar) large amounts of fruit should be eaten regularly. Although fruit is definitely a healthy food loaded with antioxidants, vitamins, phytochemicals and fibre, eating a large percentage of your carbohydrates from fructose is not sufficient to help you build lean muscle and strength.

Lactose (diary sugar) is a naturally occurring simple sugar you can eat in moderation if you tolerate it well; however a lot of people do NOT. Lactose intolerance is the inability to digest diary products. There are a lot of people who don’t have the enzyme to digest lactose and therefore get gas, bloating, water retention, abdominal cramps and diarrhea when they eat diary products. Diary products should not be used as your primary source of protein or carbohydrates.

Diary products contain simple carbohydrates and all simple carbohydrates should be minimised in your diet. Whereas complex carbohydrates include both starchy and fibrous carbs. It is the fibrous carbs (vegetables) you should include in your diet more frequently. Also starchy carbs are often slow release (low GI) and they contain too many grams of carbohydrates and these you should also minimise.

Protein
All animal proteins (fish, meat, poultry and eggs) are ‘complete’, which means they contain all the necessary amino acids. If you are a vegetarian, your diet would combine different plan products (rice and beans) to include all the essential amino acids.

Fat
Fats play a vital role in many processes including primary energy reserves, membrane constituents, hormones, fat-soluble vitamins, thermal insulators and biological regulators. For these reasons, fats are absolutely essential in your diet. Most vegetable fats are ‘good fats’, while most animal fats are ‘bad fats’. Trans fats are the main problem and must be avoided.

Many food companies use trans fats to make their food more appealing. Some examples of these foods include cakes, pastries and biscuits which give it a more solid consistency, and to prolong shelf life. Trans fats are also found in vegetable shortenings, some margarines, crackers, and snack foods. Like saturated fat, trans fats are bad for the heart.

Try to avoid products that have partially hydrogenated oil listed on the ingredients list and also avoid foods that have high trans fat content e.g. deep fried fast foods and takeaways, cakes, pies and packaged biscuits.

Alcohol
Just like protein, carbs and fat, alcohol is a macronutrient. Whilst training for dragonboating try to minimise the amount of alcohol intake and keep in mind that there are 7 calories in a gram of alcohol. As it is a toxin it is the first fuel to be used during your recovery process and that way you are not getting the proper nutrients into your blood stream if you have alcohol too often.

As you may have realised by now, nutrition plays a huge role in dragonboating. Though, the above nutrition can be applied to any other sport. What is crucial is understanding how it works and then tracking what you are feeding your body. Next week I will be continuing on how to choose the right foods to plan for a good diet.