Report: Mel Cockshutt of Port Macquarie Surf Life Saving Club
A record number of competitors (approximately 2000) lined up for the 2011 Stramit Country Surf Life Saving Championships at South West Rocks on January15-17.
Participants ranged in age from 7 to 70 years old and represented 37 Country NSW Surf Life Saving Clubs.
The Championships are a showcase of the surf life saving disciplines involving the beach, surf swimming and surf craft.
On Saturday and Sunday the Masters (30 plus), under 15-u19 year olds and Open Competitors took to the beach including competitors from the far north coast beaches such as Yamba and Ballina, which only days before had been affected by the flood waters.
Port Macquarie SLSC (Flynns Beach) came away as the dominate Mid-North Coast Branch finishing 2nd in the pointscore for Masters behind Byron Bay and 3rd in the Masters/Open Combined pointscore.
In the Junior (Nippers) competition Tacking Point SLSC were the dominate Club finishing 5th overall in the pointscore.
The normally calm conditions at South West Rocks did not eventuate, the recent weather activity brining in a large swell and very muddy water.
The boats had the best conditions of the day, competing early Saturday morning.
On Sunday, the beach conditions did not improve, resulting in the majority of water activities for the juniors to be held over to the Monday.
On Monday, with still no improvement to conditions near the Surf Club, the Nipper water events were transferred to Arakoon/Trial Bay.
While the conditions may have been testing on the competitors on Saturday and Sunday, the spectators watched in awe (and sometimes horror) at the spectacular spills that occurred in both Board and Ski Events.
In the Masters competition, the Mid-North Coast Clubs featured prominently in the medal tally in the water and the beach events.
Port Macquarie, Tacking Point, Wauchope-Bonny Hills (WBH) and South West Rocks Club members were all successful in the Men’s and Women’s Surf Races with Duncan Kirkland (Port Macquarie), Scott Williams (WBH) and Carolyn Turnham (PMQ) taking out gold in their respective age categories.
In the coveted and prestigious Ironman Port Macquarie’s Duncan Kirkland and Paula Stone bought home a bronze each (Ironman is a Swim, Board and Ski).
Silver medals were the story of the day in the Board events for both men and women with Tacking Points’ ChesSuska taking out gold in the 60 Plus Ski Event.
In the Rescue Tube Event bronze was the order of the day across the categories with Carolyn Turnham breaking the mould with a win in her age-group category.
On the beach the Female Masters had wins in the Beach Sprint (Beverley Towle, PMQ), Beach Flags (Linda Perkins, Tacking Point), 2km Beach Run (Melinda Cockshutt, PMQ) and in the Men’s Beach Sprint (Darron Gill, WBH) and in the Beach Flags (David Plews, PMQ) in their respective age categories.
Murray Thompson (Tacking Point) and George Fowler (WBH) took gold in both their sprint and flag events.
In the Open and u15-u19 Categories, the Mid-North Coast Clubs were strong on the beach.
Selina Warrington (PMQ) dominated the Sprint Track with wins in the U17 and Open Sprint and continued here winning streak in the u17 Beach Flags.
Tacking Point and Port Macquarie were among the medals in the beach sprint relays.
Liam Wright and Jo Wright took out gold and silver in the u15 2km Beach Run.
In the Water, WBH won gold in the Male Tube Rescue Event and Amber Carew (PMQ) and Anthony Donohoe (WBH) dominated in the Surf Board Riding.
The juniors (Nippers) competed on Sunday and Monday all with huge smiles on their faces.
Wauchope Bonny Hills SLSC’s Keely Sinclair dominated the u10 winning gold in the Beach Sprint and Beach Flags.
Tacking Point’s SLSC Ryan Horton almost made it a golden double in the u9 beach sprint and flags, narrowly missing out on gold in the flag event.
Tacking Point Relays were strong winning the u9, u10, u12 Beach Relays so predictably took out the All-Age Beach Relay. Port Macquarie U10 squad performed fantastic over the weekend with wins in the Beach Sprint (Tyler Hyde), Beach Flags (Josh Dwyer) and finalists in the Surf Swimming and Board events. Sprinting genes are obviously in the Hyde family, with Jasmin Hyde taking out the u8 Beach Sprint.
Miren Davies was the strongest all rounder placing in the Beach Sprint, Beach Flags and U8 Wade.
In the coverted Ironman Henry Pannifex from Tacking Point SLSC took out a bronze in the u14 race. This went nicely with his silver medal in the swim and bronze in the Board.
Tacking Point’s Junior March Past team performed well and was rewarded with a silver medal with Port Macquarie coming in 4th.
There are now over 40,000 junior surf lifesavers (Nippers) in Australia.
Nippers gives children surf awareness and surf safety skills so that they can keep themselves safe at the beach.
The Junior Program has a pathway for people to ultimately get their Bronze Medallion and develop in patrolling life savers.
If you would like to know more about Nippers and/or how to become a Volunteer Surf Life Saver, please contact the Club near your beach or contact info@pmslsc.com.au.
