Hearts of Steel

Dragon Boat. Paddling. Breast Cancer. These words are the foundation for what helped us form our organization. We officially launched on the Allegheny River in Pittsburgh, PA in May 2017 with 21 survivors and several local supporters in the community. A robust desire, gritty determination, and perseverance intermingled with dedicated leadership and hard work all came together with much effort in creating our new Breast Cancer Survivor Dragon Boat Paddling team, Pittsburgh Hearts of Steel! This wouldn’t have been possible without the continuous help, support, and encouragement from the Three Rivers Rowing Association (TRAA) in Millvale, PA, which has given us a place to call home.

Our inaugural outing, which was our only race in 2017, took us to Northern Kentucky. Not only did our team come home with a win, but also the desire, excitement, and determination to come back stronger and continue to build our team and reputation. In 2018, our second year, we competed in Buffalo, New York and Cooper River, New Jersey, and again back in Northern Kentucky, earning medals at every venue and ending the season with a gold first-place win! One of the highlights of our organization to date is that we got the opportunity to compete at the 2018 International Breast Cancer Paddling Commission Festival in Florence, Italy, which occurs every four years in different destinations around the world.