Clearwater's team of 35 lifeguards is preparing to defend their regional title.
By EILEEN SCHULTE
Published July 14, 2003
[Times photo: Douglas Clifford]
Clearwater Beach lifeguard Travis Nuttall, 22, of Palm Harbor is training for Wednesday's regional competition on the beach.
CLEARWATER - You may not realize this, but Clearwater's lifeguards are some of the best lifeguards from here to Miami Beach.
Saving lives? No problem. Finding lost kids? You bet.
Treating a nasty stingray wound? Here, put a heat pack on it.
Winning the United States Lifesaving Association Southeast Regional Lifeguard Competition?
They are last year's champions.
Starting Wednesday, all 35 Clearwater Beach lifeguards will defend their title at the 23rd annual contest on Clearwater Beach.
It will be brutal. This isn't like some sort of surreal TV show where lifeguards prance around in low-cut bathing suits with fake tans and lipstick. These people are the real thing, athletes for sure.
"Our lifeguards make the Baywatch people look ill," said Bev Buysse, laughing.
Buysse, Assistant Director of Clearwater's Marine and Aviation department, said 110 open-water lifeguards from all over coastal Florida - including Fort Lauderdale, Deerfield Beach, Hollywood, Lake Worth, Pompano Beach, Miami Beach, Boca Raton and Palm Beach - will participate.
The two-day competition will feature 13 different events, including a 400-meter surf swim, an 800-meter rescue board race, a surf boat race using the old dory rowboats (lifeguards now use water scooters to reach victims), a race in which a rescuer swims 300 meters out in the gulf and tows a victim to shore and an ironman contest.
"You run 100 meters, do a 300-meter swim, run 100 meters," said Buysse. "Then they do a 400-meter rescue board paddle, a 100-meter run, a 500-meter surfski paddle and a 100-meter run."
A surfski looks like a kayak.
Clearwater lifeguards Chris Lang, 22, and Scott McGrail, 28, are favorites to win some of the events, especially the rescue race and surf swim.
They are ready to defend their standing on their home beach, Buysse said.
"They've been training pretty hard," she said. "They didn't get fat (over the past year)."
Others hopefuls include: Luke Semple, 26, the surfski champ from last year; William "Skip" Maxwell, 31, who recently was on a team that paddled from Cuba to Key West and was last year's rescue board race winner; and Emily Wehr, 22, who won a 2-mile women's open beach run last year.
Buysse admits there may be one weak link in the 35-member team.
"Me," she said, laughing.
She's using up valuable energy organizing the event and needs help. She's seeking volunteers.
Not to play helpless victims waiting to be saved, but lane timers.
The requirements?
"You have to be able to start and stop a watch," said Buysse. "And be able to stand the heat on the beach on a July afternoon."
As for the contestants, they don't win any money for their efforts.
"Just the knowledge we have the best lifeguard agency in the region," said Buysse.
The next event is in Cape May, N.J., for the national competition next month. Some of the winners of the Clearwater contest may attend.
If you go: The 23rd annual USLA Southeast Regional Lifeguard Competition will take place from 9 a.m. to sunset Wednesday and 9 a.m. to about 5:30 p.m. Thursday on Clearwater Beach north of Pier 60. If you would like to volunteer, call (727) 224-7002. Otherwise, it's free. Bring a beach chair and enjoy.
Did You Know?
According to Bev Buysse, Assistant Director of Clearwater's Marine and Aviation department:
- 35 full- and part-time lifeguards keep watch over a mile-and-a-half stretch of Clearwater Beach and Sand Key.
- During the summer eight watchtowers are set up on Clearwater Beach, one on Sand Key.
- One lifeguard watches between 500 and 2,000 beachgoers every day during the summer.
- On a typical summer day, there are anywhere from five to 10,000 people on Clearwater Beach.
- Lifeguards are on duty from 9:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. every day, 365 days a year.
- They don't do it for the money: Lifeguards make between $8.50 and $21 an hour.
- Most lifeguards on Clearwater Beach consider their job a career.
- They reported no shark bites in the last year.
- A sand bar between the swim area and the open gulf helps keep large sharks and other mammals out.
- But not dolphins. The most common question for lifeguards? "When is the dolphin show?" (Dolphins have no set schedules. Buysse said they come out when they are good and ready and not before as they are not being paid).
- Most common complaints from beachgoers? Stingray injuries.
- Possibly the most boring task? Parents ask lifeguards to help find lost kids all the time.
- Most lifeguards wear SPF 40 sunscreen.
- All wear sunglasses.
- All towers have umbrellas for shade.
- Most get skin cancer screenings every year.
- There were no drownings on Clearwater Beach in the last year.
