The first time Pennie Rees and Cathie Harrison crossed paddles was seven years ago.

Roberta Piercy took a seat next to them four years later.

Now the trio from Coupeville is nearly inseparable.

Rees, Piercy and Harrison are bonded by a passion for dragon boat racing, which they’ve each felt has softened the blow of growing older.

Their connection to the sport and drive to succeed is taking them places.

All the way to the southern coast of Australia, in fact.

Rees, Piercy and Harrison are part of a 50-plus women’s masters dragon boat team from Washington that has qualified for the 2016 Club Crew World Championships in Adelaide in April.

It’s been quite a journey for the three women, involving as many as six workouts on the water a week and trips throughout Western Washington and British Columbia to practice and gain racing experience.

With Coupeville as the launching point, the trips also have racked up vehicle odometers, ferry rides and hotel bills, sparking creative ways to cut costs.

“I have to sleep with Cathie,” Rees said with a laugh. “Bert has the other bed. I mean, you really get to know people.”

But none of the three were complaining about such sacrifices.

At ages when many people start to slow down, Rees, 72; Harrison, 70; and Piercy, 56; have put their feet on the accelerator.

Aside from the rewards of a team sport with social appeal, the Coupeville women are mostly drawn to the intense workouts that have strengthened their core and upper bodies and caused them to shed pounds.

“It’s totally invigorating,” said Piercy, who’s lost 35 pounds since she started competing in 2013.

“It is wonderful,” Rees said. “But the thing I think is important is that when people get older, they don’t have to get old. You can pursue a dream, keep working out and keep pushing yourself. There are still new horizons.”

Although all three women are members of the Whidbey Island-based Team Tsunami that works out regularly in Oak Harbor, they each joined a more competitive team with the Seattle Club SAKE Dragon Boat Club to elevate their skills and knowledge of the centuries-old sport that originated in China, and to gain more intense workouts.

That sort of club competition led to their selection on WAM, the Washington State women’s masters team. They are one of 25 hand-picked women on the 50-plus team’s roster., which trains up to three times per week in Seattle.

The WAM team performed impressively and finished second to perennial powerhouse Wasabi Paddling Club of Portland at the Pacific Regionals in Vancouver, Wash., in August.

The Portland team announced in October that it decided not to go to the world championships, giving the Pacific Region’s automatic berth to worlds to the team from Washington.

Until that announcement, WAM was still hoping to possibly land the United States’ fifth and final wild card berth to the world championships in their women’s masters division based on how well they performed in tight races against Wasabi.

WAM lost three 250-meter races to Wasabi by less than one second combined, then beat Wasabi in one out of three 500-meter races.

“We were hoping for the wild card, knowing that there was a slim chance,” Harrison said.

Then they got the news from the Pacific Dragon Boat Association — WAM was going to Australia, the first women’s team to represent Washington state in world competition and the state’s first masters team.

“Disbelief,” Rees said. “It’s the Olympics of dragon boating.”

“I think we had practice the next day down in Seattle,” Piercy said.

In total, five U.S. women’s 50-plus masters teams totalling 125 competitors will be headed to the world championships. Three will be from Coupeville.

“Isn’t that cool?” said Harrison.

To help the trio get to the world championships, the ladies have set up a GoFundMe site at www.gofundme.com to try to raise $3,500 apiece to help pay for airfare and accommodations. Type in “Whidbey Women Dragon Boat Paddlers” under the search field if you wish to help.