MBC Manila Bay Sea Sports Festival is an annual event hosted by Manila Broadcasting Company and the Manila Boating Club. The 11th MBC Summer Sea Sports Festival happened last 8-9 March 2014. It was a 2-day celebration which started by a boat parade along Manila Bay and a mock race of dragon boat teams last Saturday, 8 March 2014. The second day, Sunday, 9 March 2014, was all about the highlight of the festival which is the dragon boat race.
The intense dragon boat race was composed of huge number of participating crews. Twenty-three (23) Open Crews, Eighteen (18) Mixed Crews and Ten (10) Women's Crews. My team Onslaught Racing Dragons participated in all entries: two entries on Opens Crew and one entry on both Mixed and Women's Crew.
 |
| ORDs Women's Crew |
 |
| With Ma'am Mel, my recruit! |
Due to my left shoulder injury I was not able to join the event. I was advised to undergo another three sessions of therapy and need to rest my shoulder so I can easily recover. It was already late afternoon when I went to the race venue to show support for my team. While on my way to the venue, I was happy to get the news that our Open's Crew (ORD Team A) already got their spot for the Finals. At that moment, I was really eager to be at the race venue so that I can catch all the intense actions as the Mixed and Women's Crew is waiting the heat for the Semis to get their final slots too! Lucky enough to arrive on time, I was able to see the Women's Crew on the loading area for their Semi-finals Heat and I took some pictures with them.
 |
| Waiting for Open's Crew Finals! |
 |
| With my visitors: Jempi and Michael |
Trailing behind just by a milliseconds, our Women's Crew failed to get the 2nd spot in order for them to get their slot for the Finals. Triton B clocked-in 1:52:23 while we clocked-in at 1:52:76. Wattah race! Our Mixed Crew suffered the same fate wherein they did not advanced for the Finals.
Having able to reached the Finals and ranked 4th Place for Open's Crew, is already a great achievement for my team. Just imagine, we are the only club crew to reach the Finals competing against the giants: Philippine Army, Philippine Coast Guard and Philippine Air Force. My team was able to achieve this through consistent hardcore training before the competition and I do believe that we will be better the coming races.
I was not able to watch the awarding ceremony because me and my friend, Michael, attended the Sunday Mass at Malate Church. We had dinner together and when we decided to go home, the party was still on going, we went there for a couple of minutes to watch some of the presentations. MBC Sea Sports Festival was indeed a great way to start the summer.
 |
| Night Party! |
