Scenes from the start of the Ocean-to- Ocean Cayuco Race

The 50th anniversary and Panama Centennial version of the Ocean-to-Ocean Cayuco Race coincided with the production weekend for The Panama News, which means that you will have to wait a day or two after our regular upload time to get the rest of the story, including complete results.

This journalists did, however, make it to Cristobal as usual for the race's start. But this was not your usual launch.

Last year there were 42 boats participating. This year there were 75. That made things a bit more hectic. One of the race's veteraan organizers, Sue Stabler, told The Panama News that "We're at the upper limit of our growth. Starts are always hard, but this is even harder."

As a regular event, the race began in 1954, as a project of the Canal Zone branch of the Boy Scouts of America. Over the years the character and sponsorship of the race changed, with the addition of girls, then adults; with the boats' transformation from the traditional dugout canoes to the sleek racing boats with rudders and covers at the bow and stern to reduce the need for bailing; with the addition of more events in the cayuco racing calendar --- first the Gamboa Regatta sprints, then the Balboa Yacht Club race to the end of the Amador Causeway and back, this year with the Hotel Melia Regatta in Gatun Lake; and with the Club de Remo de Balboa, Abou Saad Shrine and many local businesses and institutions taking up where the defunct Canal Zone Boy Scouts left off. There was some doubt about whether the tradition could survive when Balboa High closed and the Panama Canal reverted to Panama, but those were dispelled the following year. Now the question is whether the growth can or will continue, and if so in which direction.

"Most of the growth this year is in the open category," Stabler said. We have more outside boats than ever." The outsiders included several crews from the United States, representation from the Royal Navy again this year, some Costa Ricans and boats from the Interior. Panama's indigenous nations, many of whose members practically grow up paddling from place to place to go about their daily business, were represented for the first time with a boat from the Wounaan community of Isla San Antonio near Gamboa. A group of participants in the 1954 race, some of them here to watch and others to paddle, came back to Panama for the event.

Thus the crowd at the captain's meeting, now held in the shade of a shelter that Panama Ports has installed since last year's race, was bigger an noisier than ever before. When the race began decades ago, this ceremony was conducted in English. In recent years, the Spanish instructions have become more important. This year, race coordinator Pablo Prieto (pictured above), used a bullhorn to give instructions in both English and Spanish. "May God bless you, and let's have a fine race," he concluded.

Not long afterwards, they were off. As in the past, it was a double start, because there would be too many swampings and collisions if all categories of boats began at once.

My favorite vantage point for the starts in years past, the last little pier before the Mount Hope drydocks, has been fenced off by Panama Ports this year. The parking lot where boats are brought in on trailers is ordinarily a container parking area now. These factors, too, may be indicators of the race's future evolution. It has come a long way since 1954 when, according to Gilbert, one of the participants back then, "We got a week's notice." "It was a matter of Boy Scouts being asked 'How'd you like to paddle a cayuco through the canal?'" added Marvin, another 1954 veteran.

The record participation this time is partly a function of Panama's centennial, but new boats have been built and they will last for years and attract new crews. The year after next we will have a new government and the Ministry of Education, which under its current administration is more interested in promoting smoking than sports in the public schools, might take an interest. The National Tourism Institute (IPAT) might become functional and realize the value of this event, and the National Sports Institute (INDE) might put it higher on its list of priorities.

The bottom line is that the Ocean-to-Ocean Cayuco Race has evolved from a Zonian tradition into an important part of Panama's sports culture and tourist economy, and that evolution has by no means run its course.

sports

Scenes from the cayuco race's start

by Eric Jackson