- July 4, 2024
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She wasn't playing with a full ... paddle.
JoAnn Moore, who admittedly was at a stage of "hopelessness" in her life, drove the 50 miles from her home in Atlanta to Georgia's Lake Lanier.
It was 2009, about four years after Moore, who now lives in Lakewood Ranch, was diagnosed with Stage IV breast cancer that had metastasized to her bones and lymphatic system.
The subsequent treatment for the cancer left her unable to walk for almost three years, so it was a victory in itself when she managed to walk the Susan Komen 5K in Atlanta in 2009. At the end of the race, Moore picked up a card which had information about Dragon Boat Atlanta, a breast cancer survivors team.
Adding to the pain of her disease was the fact she had lost her ability to be super active. She was a tennis player and a water skier, among other sports. She had to leave her profession of 29 years, being a high school science teacher and department chair.
So it was off to Lake Lanier to have a look.
What she saw was a group of breast cancer survivors making positive waves on the water. She wanted ... needed ... to get into that boat.
But she didn't have the strength to pull the water with a paddle. She asked anyway.
The team made her an altered paddle, where the flat blade that goes into the water was cut in half. That way, she could practice the form as the paddle blade would slide through the water without resistance.
"It was exhilarating," Moore said June 28 during an interview at Nathan Benderson Park, her rowing home since 2014. "I loved it. Perhaps this was a sport I could get into and not damage my spine. I had cancer in every vertebra. At that time, I was excited if I could walk to the mailbox without getting tired. It hurt so much to walk, my husband (Brian Moore) had put sponge rubber in my shoes. This was extremely uplifting."
Fifteen years after she picked up that altered paddle — 17 years after she had been told she was likely to expire — the 71-year-old Moore is a globetrotter, bringing her brand of exhilaration to blossoming programs.
On June 24, she had just returned from Vancouver, Canada to help with the paddlers there. Two weeks earlier, she was in the Czech Republic in Prague. Two weeks before that it was Puerto Rico.
In 2016, Moore wanted to take her new-found love of paddling to another level. Breast cancer paddlers were making huge strides in their physical and emotional well-being, but she felt the sport was falling short in offering "premier" breast cancer paddlers an outlet. She started the team "Linked in Pinks," which she calls the cream of the breast cancer survivors paddlers.
"We wanted to elevate the level of cancer survivor teams," she said.
Linked in Pinks began traveling to paddling events and not only became known for its efficiency on the water, but as promoters and teachers of the sport. She holds the title of founder and captain. She also is the southern representative for the International Breast Cancer Paddlers Commission and serves on the competition and technical committee for the United States Dragon Boat Federation.
"As we began to travel, we became considered one of the elite teams in the world," Moore said. "Now we get invited to train new breast cancer teams. We have a stellar reputation."
Linked in Pinks has trained breast cancer programs in Argentina and Brazil, among other countries, and in January, it trained the first breast cancer Dragon Boat team in Mexico in Puerto Aventuras.
Everything the members of Linked in Pinks do is volunteer. But Moore said it provides her with something more valuable than money.
"This has been the most rewarding experience of a lifetime," she said. "We teach them how to thrive through Dragon Boat racing. Oh, the joy you see in these women. Their faces are indescribable."
Anyone in East County who wants to check out that joy can attend the Unleash Your Dragon event Jan. 22-25 at Nathan Benderson Park.
JoAnn and Brian, who have been married 46 years, moved their primary base to Lakewood Ranch in 2014. While living in Atlanta, they had purchased a second home there and discovered Nathan Benderson Park and its Dragon Boat programs.
The late Nathan Benderson, who had donated $1 million to Sarasota County to transform Cooper Creek Park into a health and wellness destination in 2007 and subsequently had the 600-acre park with a 400-acre lake named after him, bought the park its first Dragon Boat in 2014 — called Nate's Hope — and the program got off the ground.
In October of 2014, teams in Tampa and Miami hosted the first big Dragon Boat event (an International Breast Cancer Paddlers Commission competition) at Nathan Benderson Park. Meanwhile, Nathan Benderson Park had talked Angela Long into starting its own program.
Moore had been competing for Dragon Boat Atlanta, but after attending the NBP event, she changed her home base.
"I moved my heart here," she said about joining Long's Survivors in Sync team.
"We've always been very strong collectively," Moore said of Survivors in Sync. "And we're still still growing strong as a breast cancer team."
In 2016 she formed Linked in Pinks because she wanted it known that breast cancer survivors could paddle as premier athletes. She also thought the team could make an impact on a centuries-old sport that only began forming breast cancer survivor teams in 1996.
Nathan Benderson Park Marketing Director Marnie Buchsbaum said Moore is an ambassador of the sport and has had a huge impact throughout the world.
"She has taken this around the world with her teaching," Buchsbaum said. "She is everywhere."
Buchsbaum said Moore's passion has also connected Nathan Benderson Park and Sarasota with Dragon Boat paddlers throughout the world.
"We love her story and we are so proud of her," Buchsbaum said. "And now people are learning more about us. The paddler piece (at Nathan Benderson Park) is big and growing."
Moore brought the idea of the Unleash Your Dragon event to Buchsbaum and Chief Operating Officer Bruce Patneaude and they loved it. They also knew Moore has the energy to make it successful. The event will include workshops, clinics, and races. Individuals can register and be placed on teams.
"If I have to wait 4 seconds for her to respond when I ask her to do something, that's a long time," Buchsbaum said of Moore. "We knew this would be a great event for the park."
Registration for the first-year event opened April 15, and within three days, they had 70 people signed up. Currently, they have 15 countries represented among the participants and they expect "hundreds" of paddlers.
Moore is most proud of the fact that the first men's prostate cancer paddling team — Butts in a Boat — from Vancouver, Canada has signed up for the event.
As a member of the IBCPC's special interest committee designed to "enhance all cancer teams, breast cancer teams and para dragon teams, and to enhance training and to elevate those teams," she is trying to encourage men with all forms of cancer to "find joy in Dragon Boat racing."
"She gives people hope, that they, too, can overcome," Buchsbaum said. "She is creating a positive spirit. They can all laugh together, and cry together."
As far as her own health, Moore said she practices three times a week, and she feels wonderful.
"I love spreading (Dragon Boat paddlers') enthusiasm for life," she said. "I love to share that optimism."
