THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, June 28, 1995 TAG: 9506270133
SECTION: VIRGINIA BEACH BEACON PAGE: 04 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY BILL REED, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 89 lines
The Virginia Beach Life Saving Service celebrated its 65th anniversary recently with its annual lifeguard competition.
A hundred of the tautest and tannest mermen and mermaids on the beach ran, swam and carried in mock victims in sand and roiling surf - all trying to win bragging rights as the fittest of their lot.
A yearly rite of passage for the official resort beach lifeguard service, the competition is aimed at honing the swimming skills and the endurance of contestants, preparing them for rescue work in the heat and crowds of midsummer.
``If you can take what is essentially a qualification drill and make it fun, that's what it's all about,'' said R.L. ``Kent'' Hinnant, who heads the Virginia Beach Life Saving Service.
Racking up the most points in the two-hour competition at 7th Street and Oceanfront were veteran guards Tom Gill and Barbara Josey, both of Virginia Beach, who sprinted and splashed their way to the top in several events.
Gill, former swimming coach at Norfolk Academy and a graduate of the College of William and Mary, won the two-man rescue event with Alley Adams, a former member of his academy swim team.
The competition, taking place Thursday in rough surf, required each team member to ``rescue'' the other. Each member had to swim 75 yards offshore and back, towing his or her teammate, who posed a helpless victim.
Josey placed first in three events. She was the first of 13 women lifeguards to cross the finish line in the mile run, a required event for all lifeguards in the life-saving service. She also won the women's leg of the run-swim-run competition and the beach flag event, contests that require endurance, speed and agility, both on land and in the water.
Josey is a graduate of Norfolk Academy and will be in her second year at Hamilton College in Clinton, N.Y., this fall.
``It's like a triathlon,'' said Hinnant, who oversaw the events with contest coordinator Kirk Liebold. ``Everybody has to compete.''
At the end of their work day Friday, Gill and Josey and the top six finishers in all five events were rewarded with plaques and medals. All 100 participants were rewarded with T-shirts and pizzas, complements of Chicho's, an Oceanfront nightspot frequented by city lifeguards.
Hinnant literally was born to the lifeguard business.
With over 30 years in the field, he has expanded a lifeguard service pioneered by his father into a single, well-oiled operation that covers almost all of the city's resort beaches from Croatan to Fort Story.
It came about in April 1987 after major jawboning by Hinnant. The City Council approved the merger of two rescue units that had split Oceanfront lifeguard duties since 1975. The single entity is called the Virginia Beach Life Saving Service.
His well-scrubbed, bronzed employees can be seen manning lifeguard stands along the resort beaches or renting beach chairs, umbrellas, rafts and skim boards to beach visitors four months of the year.
Hinnant is the son of the late Graham ``Dusty'' Hinnant who, with John Smith, organized what was the first lifeguard service on the resort beach in the 1930s.
It has evolved, Hinnant contends, into the ``most sophisticated lifeguard service on the East Coast,'' because many of its members are trained emergency medical technicians as well as Red Cross certified lifeguards.
``We even carry O.B kits in case we have to make a (child) delivery,'' Hinnant said. ``And we can handle neck and back injuries.'' MEMO: WINNERS
Mile-run - men, John Hunt; women, Barbara Josey.
Two-man rescue - team of Tom Gill and Alley Adams.
Four-by-100 relay - team of Forrest Carr, Chris Graves, David Finch
and Jonathon Morris.
Run-swim-run - men, Davis Reed; women, Barbara Josey.
Beach flags - men, Phil Allen; women, Barbara Josey. ILLUSTRATION: Photos by L. TODD SPENCER
ABOVE: Forrest Carr competes in the Beach flag event. He was on the
winning team in the 4-by-100 relay.
LEFT: Chrisy Russo tries to get a jump on the male-dominated field
in the mile-run competition. The contests require endurance, speed
and agility - both on land and in the water.
Photos by L. TODD SPENCER
ABOVE: Chrisy Russo catches her wind and watches the rest of the
two-man rescue competition.
RIGHT: Martin LeBlane competes in the run-swim-run event. He
finished second overall in points among the men.
by CNB