About

Our Story

Bradford Barracudas became a formally constituted club in December 2017, but to get the full story we need to go back a little further than that.

May 2011 - The month of a meeting of two unstoppable forces, one - John Galt, a man who’s life outside of the daily grind was dragon boating, he lived, breathed and slept dragon boating, the other - Louise Clarke, the manager of Doe Park Water Activities Centre in the club's home town of Bradford.

July 2011 - A trip over to Crosby lakeside to meet the Crosby Crusaders saw staff from the Bradford Council Adventure Development Unit and teachers from Appleton Academy getting a taste of what all this dragon boating fuss was about. Oh and boy did they love it!!

September 2011 - Under the umbrella of Crosby Crusaders,

“Crusaders Bradford” took part in the scratch event at the

British Dragon Boat Racing Association National Championship.

Guess what.... we only went and won!

October 2011 - After a little piece about our exploits in the local

rag we got an invite to City Hall to meet the Lord Mayor of

Bradford at the time. This then planted the seed for the Lord

Mayor's Dragon Boat festival which was formed in 2015. This has

gone on to be the fantastic event now known as “The Bradford

Dragon Boat festival”, which continues to grow year on year.

April 2012 - A successful funding bid made by pupils from Appleton Academy, one of which is a current member of the club, raised money to purchase two 9m dragon boats, paddles, funding for coach training development within the area and entry to the British Dragon Boat Racing Association National Championship later in the program.

September 2015 - Following the dragon boat festival in 2015, this prompted interest from adults wanting to continue with the sport. As Doe Park already had boats, John Galt, the brainchild behind the festival, started running some sessions from the centre.

May 2016 - This led to a group of people from Bradford linking

again with Crosby Crusaders to take on the gruelling

TransPennine challenge, 128 miles, 91 locks over 6 days,

stopping off at Saltaire to compete in the 2016 Bradford Dragon

Boat Festival before finishing off at Leeds the day after.

There was no stopping dragon boating developing in Bradford and it was firmly established on the map. With the continued support from John and resources from Louise the sport continues to grow.

September 2017 - Louise Clarke got all the paperwork in order to form the club and persuaded her boss to buy a race boat. This made a surprise appearance at our first outing as a club, competing at the British Dragon Boat Racing Association National Championship, where we went on to win third place in the 500m open plate competition.

December 2017 - We had our first AGM, the club committee was elected and formally constituted.

March 2018 - The club was awarded Club/Non Professional Team winner award alongside highly commended sporting highlight at the Bradford Sports Awards.

June 2019 - The club's youth team (made up of member's children) entered the Bradford Dragon Boat Festival Youth Day after only having a few training sessions as a team. They dug deep and battled hard, leading to them being crowned senior youth winners in the evening event.

June 2022 - The club entered the Bradford Dragon Boat

Festival Super Cup and showed Bradford what the club is

capable of, beating some strong opposition and walking

away with the Super Cup winners trophy.

July 2022 - A new British Dragon Boat Racing Association event was set up on the club's door step. This was a great opportunity for the club to race without having to travel too far. The club attended the event which was hosted by Manvers Dragons in Rotherham and went on to achieve 3rd place in the 200m mixed event, 2nd place in the 500m mixed event and 2nd place in the 2000m mixed event.

May 2024 - Saw the annual trip to Tees Valley Dragons for their British

Dragon Boat Racing Association event. The club joined up with

Cambridgeshire Royals where we secured 3rd place in the 500m open event

and 3rd place in the 2000m open event.

2026 sees the Bradford Barracudas celebrate 10 years of establishment with various exciting events taking place. Watch this space to see what we get up to!