Young lifesavers battle fierce conditions at the Regional championships last weekend. Copacabana SLSC hosted the Newcastle Permanent’s Junior Branch Championships, where nippers from all 15 Central Coast clubs fought it out on the sand and in big challenging surf to see who took out the championship titles.
“With over 1,000 nippers participating, the skills on display were exceptional. Being able to negotiate the big shore break, wind and side chop really shows the level of competency our young lifesavers develop through their surf training” said David Unger – Director of SLSCC Surf Sports.
Avoca proved they were the best taking out the overall point score on 444 pts followed by Umina- 333 pts and Terrigal 319 pts.
Avoca’s junior board squads were firing with five board relay wins in the U/9 females, U/11s male, females and U12s male, female age group. Avoca’s domination was led by young U/10 Tahlia Tebb who decimated the field, picking up three golds in the flags, sprint and surf race.
Umina’s U/14 seniors Cashar Darwin and Hannah Stevenson went head to head against their rivals – Avoca’s Jerome Drobot in the males and North Avoca’s Emma Duggan in the females. All four competitors showed great skills and talent picking up medals in the swim, board and ironperson events.
A junior to watch from Umina was U/11s rising star Amber Skye Stevenson, who dominated in her field, taking out the triple crown in the swim, board and ironperson events.
Terrigal continued to show their swim depth with their U/12s and U/13s females and the U/14 males and females taking out the top spots in the swim teams. U/12 Hayden McGregor and U/13 Zahra Green continued their success by both taking out the swim and ironperson events.
Next up for these young lifesavers is the NSW State Championships being at Swansea Belmont at the end of February.