St Clair Surf Lifesaving Club
SLSC Champs
Held over the weekend of the 20th and 21st of February, this year’s Canterbury Champs gave St Clair SLSC athletes heading to nationals this year an opportunity for competitive racing.With a team of 30 travelling up to New Brighton for the event results of the highest level were expected from the team. The event mixes both IRB and Sand into a full weekend of racing.
Racing commenced on Saturday with the IRB events. St Clair had four crews entered this year with the Under 21 crew of Niam Chronican and James Rolfe, Senior crews of Jake Smith and Chris Guild and Mark Freeman and Michael Crombie and women’s crew of Carla and Steph Laughton.
The Under 21 crew of Niam and James were competing in their first IRB event so learning the racing environment was paramount for them first up. Three solid races with minimal mistakes marked a success weekend for this newly formed crew.
The senior white crew of Jake and Chris performed well all weekend and save for a bit of bad luck would have topped the dais in the Assembly rescue. Their best result for the weekend was a third in the Tube Rescue.
The senior black crew of Mark and Michael raced well all weekend without achieving any notable finishes from their four races.
The women’s crew of Carla and Steph swept all before them going on to win each race in their division (Tube Rescue, Mass Rescue, Assembly Rescue and Single Rescue)
Overall in the IRB section St Clair finished third.
After the conclusion of the IRB events, the attention moved to the craft arena where St Clair had a full complement of competitors.
Unfortunately St Clair was not able to achieve consistent results in the individual events with the highlight of the morning being the win for Carla Laughton in the Open Women’s Ski Race. Sophie Robb also placed third in the Open Women’s Board Race.
The highlight’s of the afternoon came in the Run Swim Run events and the beach arena.
Steph Laughton won the Open Women’s Run Swim Run by a comfortable margin with team mate Nicole Walker coming in third. Adam Simpson won the Under 19 Men’s Run Swim Run in similarly convincing fashion.
In the beach events, 2009 national champion Joe Kemp showed good form to dominate the Under 19 Men’s Beach Sprint and then narrowly miss winning the Open Men’s Beach Sprint to fellow national champion Ben Ryan from South Brighton. The highlight of this day will however be remembered for the ease with which the Under 19 Men’s Beach Relay team won their event with the surprising Dan Gold and Abe Kemp showing unknown speed to drive the team home.
Sunday brought far calmer conditions that those experienced on Saturday and the events kicked off with the Long and Short Course Canoe races.
St Clair had two crews involved in the Canoe events with both crews coming away from the racing with a placing each. The Under 19 Men in the Short Course event and the Open Women in the Long Course event.
The rest of the day’s events ran well for St Clair with many significant placing’s being achieved notably the Open Women’s Surf Teams who won the event by finishing in the first four places, Steph Laughton 1st, Hannah Cullen 2nd, Nicole Walker 3rd and Carla Laughton 4th for a grand total of 10 points. Second placing’s were also achieved in the Under 19 Women, Open Women and Open Men’s Board Relays.
The final events for the day were the Diamond/Iron races and the Taplin relay’s. With competitors entered in each event for the first time in several years club strength was beginning to shine through.
In the Under 16 events Angus McKenzie and Cam Burrows raced well in their Ironman final and Kim Martyn finished strongly just outside the places in her diamond event. In the Under 19 events Adam Simpson battled hard with the two South Brighton competitors eventually giving way on the final ski leg to finish third, Hannah Cullen finished fourth in the Under 19 Women’s race. In the Open Women’s race only two competitors entered on the day both from St Clair (Nicole Walker and Steph Laughton) these two girls had an epic battle all the way to the finish line with Steph winning the run to the line, in the Open Men’s race James Coombes failed to build on a strong board leg eventually finishing fourth.
The final series of events were the Taplin relay’s with St Clair’s Under 16 Men’s team kicking things off. For a team of young competitors racing in unfamiliar disciplines their fourth placing was pleasing to see. Both St Clair teams finished third in their events after contesting for the lead through the event both were unfortunate not to cross the line first. The Open Women’s team of Carla, Nicole and Steph chased South Brighton hard all the way to finish 2nd. Thus it was left to the Open Men’s team to take chase the title the other teams had battled so hard to achieve. In an event Chairman Antony Mason described as the best team effort he had seen from a St Clair men’s team for some time St Clair took the race to the other teams from the opening board legs by James Coombes and Mick Hastie holding a lead into the swim events which after impressive swims by both Rhys Applegarth and Adam Simpson became daylight heading into the final two ski legs. Prior to the event the strength of the Taylor’s Mistake team in the ski legs was highlighted and through these two legs they gradually narrowed the gap culminating in Taylor’s final paddler Liam O'Loughlin joining our own Joel Davies on the final wave of the day. Taking what looked to be a better line Liam had the jump on Joel but showing determination beyond his physical limits Joel reeled him to cross the line first.
A remarkable way to end Canterbury Champs for the St Clair team.
Surf Lifesaving Canterbury Champs Results 2010
Southern Region Ocean Athletes
St Clair SLSC's younger brigade were in action at the Southern Region Ocean Athletes held at South Brighton in Christchurch over the weekend of the 6th and 7th of February.Building on a couple of seasons of growing success St Clair once again mixed it with the best clubs on offer in the Southern Region. Unfortunately outstanding results from all competitors was not quite enough to clinch the overall title from South Brighton SLSC.
In previous years St Clair has achieved some wonderful individual results but have failed to record consistent results in team events. This year however the strength of the club began to show through more and more and exciting times are ahead for the club based off the current crop of young athletes.
Full results
SLSO Championships
St Clair SLSC highlights from the recent Otago Championships.Once again St Clair SLSC were to the forefront of results from the annual SLSO District Championships. Across all six divisions St Clair had many athletes who excelled both individually and as teams.
Official results show a comfortable overall win for St Clair.
Several individuals are also gained overall age group titles and these include.
- Carina Doyle (Under 16 Women)
- Sophie Robb (Under 19 Women)
- Adam Simpson (Under 19 Men)
- Steph Laughton (Open Women)
- James Coombes (Open Men)
Otago Title Holders 2010
Open Men
Ski Race: Heath Ratten
Board Race: Mick Hastie
Run Swim Run: Rhys Applegarth
Beach Sprints, Beach Flags, Ironman, Surf Race: James Coombes
Open Women
Ski Race, Ironwoman: Carla Laughton
Board Race, Beach Sprints, Surf Race, Run Swim Run: Steph Laughton
Beach Flags: Rosie Hodson
Under 19 Men
Beach Sprints, Beach Flags: Joe Kemp
Surf Race, Run Swim Run, Ironman: Adam Simpson
Under 19 Women
Ski Race, Board Race, Ironwoman, Beach Flags: Sophie Robb
Under 16 Men
Beach Flags: Jayden Mee
Under 16 Women
Board Race, Ski Race: Kim Martyn
Surf Race, Run Swim Run, Diamond Lady: Carina Doyle
North Island IRB Champs
The North Island IRB Champs were held over the weekend of the 12th and 13th of December at Whanagamata. St Clair sent 3 crews to contest the event racing in the Women's, Senior and Under 21 divisions.
In the Women's division, Carla and Stephanie Laughton won the Single Rescue, finished 2nd in the Mass Rescue and 4th in the Tube and Assembly Rescue's.
In the Senior division, Jake Smith and Mick Crombie achieved their best result in making the final of the Single Rescue.
In the Under 21 division, Rhys McAlevey and Matt Bradley made the Assembly Rescue final.
Marlow Pies White Island Race
The annual Marlow Pies White Island Race was held in perfect conditions last Saturday.
The traditional start to the surf events calendar in Otago, the event once again did not disappoint with 55 competitors taking part.
Most significant of the results for the day were the breaking of two race records.
Carla Laughton (Surf Ski) recorded the fastest time ever for a female whilst also finishing in the top 3 overall for the event.
Sam McCutcheon (Malibu Board) recorded the fastest ever time by a board paddler in the event in a swift 38.20.
Overall line honours for the event was won by Brighton's Ben Davidson pipping Steve Thomas from St Clair who had stuck to Ben like glue for the whole race narrowly missing out on sliding past on the final wave.
The St Clair Salty Dog crew were the first Canoe home winning the Darcy Christopher Trophy and also the St Clair paddle on handicap.