From Orange to gold: two locals who took on the world and won

With five gold and six bronze medals between them, Orange’s ‘Golden Girls’ of dragon boating have done Australia proud in their first world championships.

Estella Ferri and Kerry Madden have both returned home from the World Dragon Boat Racing Championships, held in Pattaya, Thailand. Typically you would see these two women in their Colour City Dragon Boat attire down at Lake Canobolas but, over the past few weeks, they have been adorning the green and gold of the Auroras, Australia’s national dragon boating team.  

“It is actually mind-blowing to don the green and gold, and to represent your country in any sport is just an incredible experience,” said Estella. “Being lucky enough to have the gold medals means that we did get to stand up on that podium. and to have the anthem playing was… wow! One of those life experiences I’ll never forget.”

For Kerry Madden, standing on the podium with her fellow teammates was surreal. She shared Estella’s sentiment, stating the whole experience took her breath away. “It’s an incredible feeling to stand on that centre one when the flag goes up. It’s like a relief that we finally did this, and it just makes you so proud to be in it and to have done the best, and to prove to the other countries that we are very good at what we do.” 

Australia finished third in the world for the small boat category, with Estella and Kerry making up five of the seven gold medals of the tally. They each competed in the small boat 200 metres, 500 metres, and two-kilometre distances for their respective age groups, and both have said the pride is still pumping through their veins. 

Both Estella and Kerry fell into the sport as little as six years ago. After competing at club level, onto regions, and then nationals, competing at the world championships was the next-level step for both paddlers. 

“I competed last year at the Asian Championships, which were again in Thailand,” said Estella. “It was an incredible experience representing your country, so when the opportunity for worlds came back, I decided to reapply.” 

“I was lucky enough to get chosen in the Western Region,” said Kerry. “After the expression of interest came around at the end of last year, Estella said, Why don’t you try out?”

A two-kilometre row time was submitted, followed by a number of trials, and the rest is history. 

From the beginning, Estella and Kerry have been training buddies, keeping each other accountable with the countless training sessions leading up to the championships. 

“I am so grateful that I had Estella, it was just such a helping hand for my training, to keep me motivated,” said Kerry.

“If I didn’t have her, it would have made it that little bit harder. I don’t know how you would have done it on your own. When it’s five o’clock in the morning and the alarm goes off to go to the gym and you didn’t want to go… I would still get up because I knew she would be there waiting for me.”

All teammates had a dedicated gym programme that required at least three days a week of weights and cardio, as well as a few pedalling sessions out on the dragon boat a week. As captain of the Auroras’ Senior A team (40 years and over), Estella attended weekly sessions in Sydney as well as whole divisional camps in Melbourne and Brisbane. Kerry also attended many of these sessions in Sydney, spending whole weekends out on the water. 

“I supported Kerry in making her own application for the world championships, and she was successful, so we both continued the journey together, which was just incredible,” said Estella.

Estella said next on the list is the Australian Masters coming up in October. The regional team will be heading down to Adelaide to compete, in anticipation of the Australian dragon boat championships happening in Perth next year. For Kerry, she is still “on a bit of a high”, and plans to keep as fit and healthy as she can.