More than 400 paddlers gathered in Lo Pagán on Saturday 24 October for the XI Intercontinental Dragon Boat Festival–VIII Memorial Jan Collins, according to San Pedro del Pinatar Town Council.
The Asociación Deportiva Pinatarense organised the event at the Centro de Actividades Náuticas Félix Martínez Bermúdez, with the waters of the Mar Menor providing the setting for the day’s competition.
For this edition, the council announced participation by teams from Canada, the United States, Germany and Spain, as part of an event that brings together sport and solidarity.
Boats for 12 and 22 paddlers
The programme brought together different formats and categories, with boats for 12 and 22 paddlers and women’s, mixed and open races, alongside the BCS category for breast cancer survivors.
The festival’s purpose extends beyond sporting results: its organisers highlight companionship, personal achievement and inclusion as values associated with taking part in this collective sporting activity on the water.
Strength and coordination go hand in hand with teamwork in a discipline whose BCS category also offers a meeting place for women who have experienced breast cancer in their lives.
A memorial connected with mutual support
The tribute remembers Jan Collins for her role in developing and promoting dragon boating among breast cancer survivors, a connection that lies at the heart of this memorial event.
The initials BCS stand for Breast Cancer Survivors and bring that shared experience into the competition, alongside the other categories included in the programme for the Lo Pagán festival.
The gathering provides an opportunity to share experiences and raise the visibility of survivors, with sport serving as an activity for mutual support and wellbeing, rather than the memorial being solely about competition.
Mayor Pedro Javier Sánchez Aznar and sports councillor Pedro A. Vivancos visited the festival on Saturday, during a day that once again brought dragon boating to the San Pedro del Pinatar coast.
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