From: Sports Destination Management
By: Mary Helen Sprecher
An Interview with Tom Gill, Public Information Officer, USLA
The USLA’s National Lifeguard Championships are a four-day competition featuring events that showcase guards’ skills. These will include board races, surf swims, surf boat races, beach flag and rescue races; running relays; iron man and iron woman competitions; and a 2K beach run. This year, the event will take place in Daytona Beach, Florida, from August 9-12.
Sports Destination Management: These championships use skills found in lifesaving – do the events change from year to year?
Tom Gill: We just celebrated our 50th anniversary in 2015, and I would say the events have changed over the years; they have evolved with the different equipment and techniques used by the guards in their everyday jobs on the beach.
SDM: The National Lifeguard Championships attract athletes from across the country. Are all the athletes active lifeguards?
Gill: Typically, we have around 1,000 competitors, and most of those are lifeguard and junior lifeguards, although some are alumni. Junior Lifeguards are a division of our membership for kids age nine to 17. Many of our chapters have programs for junior guards, and they offer a great opportunity for people to give their children water safety knowledge, and get them involved in a physical activity. SDM: Is the event held in a different place each year? Gill: Yes, it moves around. We sometimes find a spot we like to hang out in, and we’ll come back to it.
The United States Lifesaving Association (USLA) is America’s nonprofit professional association of beach lifeguards and open water rescuers. The USLA works to reduce the incidence of death and injury in the aquatic environment through public education, national lifeguard standards, training programs, promotion of high levels of lifeguard readiness and other means. A full history of the evolution of the sport, and consequently, Association, can be found here.