St Clair Surf Life Saving Club News Feed

Beginner Ski Sessions

2010-07-29 00:00:00

St Clair will be running a number of sessions for beginners in ski paddling. These sessions will be held at 10:00am on Sunday mornings at the St Clair boatshed.

A session will be held each Sunday from August 8 to September 5.

To register for this course or for more info please contact James Coombes.

Project Groundswell Update

2010-07-12 00:00:00

The proposal to adopt the Project Groundswell model has been formally accepted by club delegates in the Otago/Southland Area.

The process is now being undertaken to liquidate the assets of Surf Life Saving Otago.

St Clair SLSC will now be directed linked with Surf Life Saving New Zealand and will be one of 18 clubs in the new Southern Region.

An administrator will shortly be appointed in the role of Club Development Officer for the Otago/Southland area.

For more information on the Southern Region please visit the SLSNZ website.

These changes are not expected to have any effect on the day to day operation of clubs in the region.

2010 Polar Plunge

2010-06-29 00:00:00

The annual St Clair Polar Plunge was held last sunday 27 June.

Estimates are that around 500 people braved the cool Southern Ocean waters for the event with roughly three times that amount watching from the relative warmth of the Esplande.

The event itself raised approximately $3000.00 for the club which will be used to assist with the provision of life saving services at St Clair Beach.

St Clair SLSC thanks all those who braved the waters for the swim, the many additional supporters and of course event organisers More FM. (and the associate sponsors)

An item regarding the Polar Plunge from the Otago Daily Times is available from the following webpage:
http://www.odt.co.nz/your-town/dunedin/112650/500-hardy-souls-survive-midwinter-plunge

St Clair Annual General Meeting

2010-05-30 00:00:00

The 99th Annual General Meeting of the St Clair Surf Life Saving Club was held on Sunday 30 May 2010.

The following members were elected as Officer Bearers for the 2010/2011 season.

Patron: Cliff Johns
President: Murray Wilson
Vice-President: Paul Fairbairn
Chairman: Antony Mason
Secretary: Carla Laughton
Skills Development Officer: James Coombes
Property Officer: Tom Garforth
Lifeguarding Officer: Stephanie Laughton
IRB Convenor: Mark Freeman
Junior Surf Convenor: Richard Murray
Senior Representative: Joel Davies
Women's Representative: Hannah Cullen
Under 19 Representative: Finn O'Connor
Honorary Accountant: Stuart McLauchlan
Honorary Solicitor: Al Moore
Honorary Medical Officers: Dr Sue Creighton, Dr Dave Gerrard & Dr Brendan O'Neill

Dunedin Winter Kayak Series 2010 Race 1

2010-04-25 00:00:00

The first event of the 2010 Dunedin Winter Kayak Series was held in a strong northerly wind on Sunday 25 April.

St Clair club members dominated the placings in the event with all paddlers in the first three places in the mens and womens categories coming from St Clair.

First overall and fastest male was associate member Dan Peacocke in a time of 53 minutes 31 seconds. Second and third overall and in the category went to Philip Pirie and James Coombes

First female home went to Carla Laughton in a shade under 1 hour followed by Nicole Walker and Sophie Robb.

Under 16 male competitor Cam Burrows was the first junior male to finish.

Other club members to race included: Michael Hastie, Joel Davies, Niall McColm, Graeme Newton (first veteran home and fourth overall), Peter Haslemore, Tom Garforth and Kel Williams.

SLSNZ March Rescue of the Month

2010-04-14 00:00:00

St Clair wins March Rescue of the Month.

An outstanding mass rescue by club members Antony Mason, Joel Davies and Phil Pirie has been awarded the Surf Life Saving New Zealand Rescue of the Month for March. Congratulations to Antony, Joel and Phil for the outstanding application of their skills in what was extreme northerly conditions on the day of the rescue. A full write up of the rescue is available from the Surf Life Saving New Zealand website: http://www.slsnz.org.nz/Article.aspx?ID=3963#March2010

St Clair Member in SLSNZ Worlds Team

2010-04-12 00:00:00

St Clair member Andrew McMillan has been named in the Surf Life Saving New Zealand team to contest the World Titles in October this year in Alexandra, Egypt. This marks the second successive worlds that Andrew has been a member of this team. It is a credit to Andrew that he has remained loyal to St Clair despite being located in Auckland for the last three years.

SLSNZ Nationals

2010-03-16 00:00:00

Improvement was again the major statement made by St Clair SLSC at the recent New Zealand Surf Lifesaving nationals.

Senior management believed that this years event would mark the point when significant results would become a consistent feature of the clubs efforts.

The event itself did not disappoint with the clubs largest points tally since the mid-1990's being the high point of a fantastic team effort.

Overall St Clair collected 5 medals in over the 3 days of the nationals with several more collected in the single day 'Masters' event.

Our medalists were:

Gold
Under 19 Men Beach Sprint: Joe Kemp
Open Women Tube Rescue: Carla and Stephanie Laughton

Silver
Under 19 Men Surf Race: Adam Simpson

Bronze
Under 19 Men Tube Rescue: Adam Simpson and Kieran Applegarth
Under 16 Women Surf Race: Carina Doyle

Other notable results included:
Jordy Fogarty finishing 5th in the Under 16 Women's Surf Race and 9th in the Under 19 Women's Run Swim Run.
Jayden Mee finishing 5th in the Under 16 Men's Beach Flags
Joe Kemp finishing 4th in the Under 19 Men's Beach Flags
Sophie Robb finishing 9th in the Under 19 Women's Board Race
Michael Hastie finishing 9th in the Open Men's Board Race
Nicole Walker finishing 8th in the Open Women's Iron Women
Rhys Applegarth finishing 5th in the Open Men's Surf Race and 8th in the Open Men's Run Swim Run
The Under 19 Women's Taplin Relay finishing 5th.
The Under 19 Men's Canoe crew finishing 4th in both the Short and Long Course events.
The Under 19 Men's Beach Relay team finishing 5th.

SLSC Champs

2010-02-26 00:00:00

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