On June 22nd, the Dragon Boat Invitational Tournament of the Yangtze River Delta and the 2023 Hefei Dragon Boat Race were held at Swan Lake in Hefei, Anhui Province. A total of 35 teams from the Yangtze River Delta region competed fiercely on Swan Lake.

The competition was divided into three categories: the Yangtze River Delta City Group, the County (City) District Group, and the Open Group. Among them, the County (City) District Group consisted of 13 teams competing in a 500-meter straight race with 22 people in a dragon boat. The City Group and the Open Group each had 10 and 12 teams respectively, competing in a 500-meter straight race with 12 people in a dragon boat. A total of 35 teams from Zhejiang, Jiangsu, Shanghai, and other cities within Anhui Province, as well as 13 counties (cities) and development zones in Hefei, competed on Swan Lake.

This year marked the first time that Hefei hosted the Dragon Boat Invitational Tournament of the Yangtze River Delta. In order to promote traditional festival culture and create a festive atmosphere, before the opening ceremony of the competition, the organizing committee also arranged performances of traditional dragon dancing, lion dancing, waist drumming, softball, and kite flying.

In addition, relevant departments organized offline and online interactive games such as land-based dragon boat races, Dragon Boat Festival poetry contests, sandbag games, Touhu (pitch-pot) games, and virtual dragon boat races at the nearby Citizen Square. As long as citizens collected 10 event check-in stamps, they had the chance to receive small gifts such as zongzi (sticky rice dumplings), mung bean cakes, and sachets.

Reported by Li Xiaodong, Chen Hao

Edited and translated by Zheng Chen