Penang Beach Carnival


Let me start by telling you how it was BEFORE the competition.

Wednesday, in our usual paddling session, coach was satisfied with our performance. He was almost certain we're gonna bag the gold medal, FOR SURE (yes he sounded damn confident) He made us believed we were already winners even before we compete wtf. Our confidence level shot up high!

Friday, sea training at Golden Sands beach, where the competition was to take place. We went with full confidence. It was hot but thank god for the wind. Sea looked fierce, waves were rough, possibly from the amount of water sports, but we weren't worried..... yet. The first batch of the men went down, they looked like they had a hard time getting the boat to move. We were watching from the shore and thought 'it couldn't be that bad!'

When they came back up, one of them said 'I hope you don't have seasickness'

Then it was finally our turn. Despite dad's reminder to wear life jacket, I decided to go without it. Getting into the boat was... clumsy. Paddling in the rough sea was much harder than it looked. The constant unpredictable waves splashing on our boat made it harder, it's either the water hit the oars too soon or we hit nothing at all. Everyone was so out of sync it's frustrating, we're as clumsy as a baby learning to walk.

The boat's condition was another problem. Unlike our more modern boat which is lighter, this one was made of wood and heavy. Inside, there was no place for leg grip or support. When we paddle, our butts kept slipping off the seat FOL kau kau

In less than 10 minutes, it hit us. Most of us started to feel sick and giddy. Training was too short of a time but we must continue to go on. Paddling with seasickness and trying not to vomit was a hell lot of effort @_@

In conclusion, when we finally got back on shore, our confidence level shot down to 0.


Gold medal my ass. Coach lied to us.


~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~.




After the horrific training the day before the competition, we weren't sure if we can pull it off. It'll be really embarrassing to lose big time to the rest of the competing teams. Like it or not, it's too late to back out, hence, die die also must try.

It was such a lovely pleasant day for a beach carnival,



though I must say I'm really disappointed with the amount of things they had there. Apart from the water sports competition, there weren't much to do or see, unless of course you want to spend the day playing sand and building sandcastles with kids.



Forget bout that part, let's focus on the race itself.

We were one of the last few people to arrive, oh wait I think we WERE the last one. We figured there's no hurry since our race doesn't start until 4pm. When we arrived, everyone was already there, the team manager was already busy talking to the coach on race registration. Some of the guys just stood or laze around talking, some.. splattered sun block and wiped on each others' body hehe



A beach volleyball game was in progress but didn't pay much attention to it.



Since there was nothing much to do but to wait, we decided to fish out our camera and start camwhoring. Man it's good to be women, self vanity knows no bounds or limits.

You see people, don't look down on us, we not only know how to party hard but also paddle hard haha The girl in white is YT, one of our close crazy, talkative, caring buddies. She actually came with us and stayed throughout the whole event with us, that's what good friends are for!



A total of 5 ladies rowers in the team



When the men saw us camwhoring, they started to tease us. We made one of them pose like an Ah Kua (transvestite) which he gladly did. He's definitely the clown of the team

Give us an 'S' shape!

I made Luke pose like a Godzilla about to stomp on the sandcastle



Feeling very much kiasu, we checked out the other competing teams. Look at their team t shirts!



Why so sexy one? Looks at ours! How to show off our tone body like that? Not that we have any to show to begin with but if you're wearing something that reveal your body parts you'll surely work harder to make sure it's presentable, no? No wonder we are all still kinda flabby la, no motivation to show off our body wtf

Oh look who came all the way to show their support! My grandpa and parents! They were very proud of me for doing this lor, and they stayed all the way to the end until I'm done with my race



After what seemed like endless waiting time, the first race finally kicked off. They began with the juniors rowing team. Our juniors, from Chung Ling high school bagged first place effortlessly! Kudos!




Second race was Men Veteran.

Here's our bunch of 'uncles'
M.U.S.T.N.O.T.L.A.U.G.H.A.T.P.E.O.P.L.E
getting ready



Pushing the boat into the sea



Eh don't look down at uncles ok! They, too bagged the first place effortlessly. The picture below showed the boat close to the finishing line and there's no other boat that came close. Bangga bangga~ Huge round of applause for the
old
men!



While waiting for their turns, the other men were getting ready for showdown. Group warmup.



And it's Premier Open category, whatever that means.



I think they came in second, automatically qualifying themselves to the finals.

The winner is none other than these bunch of super fit, super toned guys from Perak Navy.



It was finally our turn! They guys were giving us so much pressure that I started to have butterflies in my stomach. My hands and feet were cold, and to be honest, I was nervous too. But can still smile and pose for the camera wtf




Coach giving us last minute instructions before we start. His last words were 'DO NOT PANIC!'



Calling for help to push the boat



So kua cheong right, so many people 'sending us off' hahaha



We paddled slowly to the other end where the starting point was. All the while, the men in the boat kept telling us not to panic -_- The more they advise the more nervous I got.


The most nerve wrecking moment had to be the final moment waiting for the race to start. Actually it was CHAOTIC, very much so. There was no referee to blow a whistle or anything. We were so blurred out we actually started late! FOLs

The other two teams at the sides started before we did, like WTF right?! I don't know who gave the GO permission, all I knew was my nervousness was all gone when our drummer in the front yelled at us to start paddling. And paddle hard we did.

We paddled with all our might. The butterflies in the stomach were replaced with tiredness and yet I can't stop. Try hard or die trying. I screamed out loud when I'm in pain and continued paddling. My strokes were probably all wrong but I just kept going. It's better than to stop and screw up other people's timing.

More vain pictures of me rowing, marked with star, third in front, left rower,
although you can't see much unless you clicked on the pictures and squint your eyes

Paddling towards the starting line




Alas, we came in 3rd :( Disappointed, real disappointed but our drummer said it was because we started later than the other two teams or else we would have had a chance in first or second... sigh...

Anyway, we still managed to collect RM200 for the team! First place was RM400, second was RM300. Ok la, not too bad right, first time ma.. only train for less than 3 months you know :P

After the race, the girls showing off their so called muscles haha.. eh the one on the right damn skinny must drink more protein powder to buff up.




Prize giving ceremony, FORWARD team very keng lor, these two from the team bagged first prize for kayaking competition



Wendy and another dude from other team bagged the second prize, you see the women in our team can be quite intimidating also ok? haha



Our team manager accepting the prize for Men Veteran



Me, the camwhore queen of the day took the spotlight for our 3rd prize



The medal



Another winning shot of the ladies, yay~!



In total, the team collected RM1200 from the race itself. 2 first prize of RM400, and 2 third prize of RM200, not too bad eh?

The sun was setting, we packed up and got ready to leave, BUT not before camwhoring with the dragonboat itself! Errrmm, please understand that this is our first time racing in a real dragonboat so we kinda got a little too excited.


Being the drummer is damn syiok ok!



The final camwhore pic of the day, our very worn out, tired and ugly faces in our ugly uniform. The shorts!!! OMG like uncle only -_-



We bid goodbye to the place. Needless to say, it had definitely been a fantastic day.




Team picture



Another race coming in December, must not slack, training has been increased to 4 times a week now FML



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