2017 USLA National Lifeguard Championships, Daytona Beach, Florida

2017 USLA National Lifeguard Championships, Daytona Beach, Florida

Every year in the United States, lifeguards from various counties and regions come together to put their lifeguarding skills to the test in the USLA National Lifeguard Championships.

This annual event sees these lifeguards from various states, regions, and counties in the USA, going head to head in contests aimed at making them better lifeguards. For the most parts, this event is all fun and games but it gets really competitive as well. Winning regions are considered to have better and more experienced lifeguards and beachgoers are naturally inclined to prefer visiting the beaches and pools there.

This year’s event was held at Daytona Beach, Florida between August 10 and August 12, 2017 and the results are in!

Senior and Junior Lifeguards participated in the competition as usual and below are the competitions and highlights of the results for the senior lifeguards. For a similar article on the Junior Lifeguards please click here.

Lifeguards went head to head in some 174 categories, some of which are

• Open Women’s Surf Race
• Open Men’s Surf Race
• Open Women’s Run-Swim-Run
• Open Men’s Run-Swim-Run and so much more

While we could probably make an analysis of the entire event in this article, we would rather not bore our readers and instead focus on the categories listed above. These categories were chosen randomly so we are not deliberately choosing any categories in a bid to make one region look better than the other.

The Open Women’s Surf race featured 20 contestants. The top five of the contestants featured 2 lifeguards from the Mid-Atlantic and Southwest regions respectively and 1 lifeguard from the Southeast region.

Hallie Petersohn of Volusia Surf Lifesaving Association (Southeast Region) was the best of the 20 contestants while Caroline Gmelich of Monmouth County (Mid Atlantic Region) came in in second place. Kelsey Cummings and Jenna Solberg both of LA County Surf Life Saving Association were both third and fourth placed respectively. The South Jersey Chapter of the Mid Atlantic region saw their lifeguard Alexandra Santer come in on fifth place.

In the Open Men’s Surf Race, Lifeguard Christian Foti of Riis Park, Mid Atlantic region beat out 19 other contestants to clinch the first prize. Hayden Hemmens of Newport Beach Ocean Lifeguard Association, Southwest Region, and International Competitor Matt Poole were both joint second place, while another Riis Park lifeguard, Thomas O’Neil came in on third place.

The Open Women’s Run Swim Run results seem somewhat like a rematch of the Open Women’s Surf race. Lifeguards Hallie Petersohn of Volusia Surf Lifesaving Association and Kelsey Cummings of LA County Surf Life Saving Association who had participated in the Open Women’s Surf race had another opportunity to go head to head and the result was turned on its head.

The Open Women’s Run Swim Run saw Kelsey Cummings (who had finished third place in the previous competition) emerge as the winner, while Hallie Petersohn (who had won the Open Women’s Surf Race) finished third place this time. Lifeguard Casey Francis of the Virginia Beach Lifesaving Association came between Cummings and Petersohn to finish second.

If you are ever at Riis Park, be sure to ask if Christian Foti is the lifeguard on duty. If you ever run into water troubles, you would need a winner like this guy to rescue you. In similar fashion to his Open Men’s Surf Race, Lifeguard Christian Foti of Riis Park, Mid Atlantic region beat out all other contestants in the Open Men’s Run- Swim- Run to win the competition.

But Christian is not the only lifeguard doing Riis Park proud as four other lifeguards from Riis Park made it to the top six. Here’s how the tables look.

In both the Junior and Senior Lifeguard competitions, the Mid Atlantic region produced several winners in various categories. Check out our previous article to see how the Junior Lifeguards fared in their own events.

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