Some 500 racers from 35 domestic and international teams will participate in Hanoi’s traditional dragon boat race scheduled for February 16 and 17 (i.e Lunar January 12 and 13), on a 600m course n West Lake – the area near Ly Tu Trong Park, and Thanh Nien and Nguyen Dinh Thi roads.The festival will be organized by the Hanoi People's Committee in collaboration with Vietnam Airlines. This is one of the activities to realize the cooperation agreement between Hanoi and Vietnam Airlines on the capital’s culture, sports and tourist development.
Hanoi dragon boat racing festival in 2018. Photo: Xuan Hoa
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Emphasizing that this year's festival will be scaled up with the participation of numerous teams and athletes compared to the first year held in 2018, Director of the Hanoi Department of Culture and Sports To Van Dong said that in two-day festival, the participants will be divided into professional groups and amateur groups to compete.
Specifically, professional competitors come from Hong Kong (China), Singapore, Malaysia, Laos and various different Vietnamese cities and provinces. They will split into male and female events (each team has 12 athletes) on January 16.
The amateur grouping consists of teams from localities in Hanoi that will enter the qualifications on January 16 and the final round the next day. The group will also see various teams from foreign embassies, public agencies, and businesses competing on February 17 (the amateur team is mixed with male and female competitors).
The festival will be open to the public for free during the competing days from 9:00am to 4:00pm on February 16 and 17.
The total value of prizes at this year's competition is nearly VND800 million (US$34,400) and the organizers will hand over flags, medals and bonuses to the athletes of the first, second, third and consolation prizes.
There will be art performances during the race.
