Guillermo Batista Hernández

“I started dragon boat because I was interested in making a team with regular people who, with some training, would do well in competitions. In Panama, the sport of rowing/paddling is ‘cayuco’ and those who do it led the dragon boat movement. When we started, we started with a group of people with varying levels of age and athleticism.

Our goal was to get these committed people to develop their physical abilities and win a race. We started with people who had never paddled before, and in our first race, we won third place! After this race, some team members left and we did not have a steerer. For the second race, we found a steerer and managed to win the 500m race of our category, which allowed us to participate in the Pan-American Dragon Boat Championships. We accomplished the task and we are now one of the top 3 teams in the region. 

At the Championships, we won a bronze medal in the 200m race, and that 200m was the distance we had always wanted to win. We typically perform better at longer distances, and in that race, we went from lowest to highest and we beat many strong teams that had been established for many years!”

[Guillermo Batista Hernández (Panama City, Panama), paddler on Panadragón.]

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