Your community club needs you! Scarborough Wombarra Surf Lifesaving Club has a strong Nippers program, but the club is desperate for adult patrolling members.
Fifteen years ago, Scarborough’s Ant Ritter joined his local life saving club. As a new father of a one-year-old boy, he thought some surf rescue skills might come in handy later. “Not growing up near the beach, I thought I should learn a few skills myself. It’s been great. Thankfully I haven’t had to rescue any of the three boys yet!"
“I say yet…” he adds, laughing.
Today, Ant is president of Scarborough Wombarra Surf Life Saving Club. And – far from needing rescuing – his two oldest sons have won top honours at Surf Life Saving Illawarra’s awards of excellence. In February, Ant’s eldest son, Sean, age 16, was named the Illawarra’s Youth Surf Lifesaver of the Year and his middle son, Eamon, 15, was awarded Junior Lifesaver of the Year.
“Last year nippers was in danger of being shut down and potentially moving to Coledale,” Ant says. “We didn’t have the numbers, or parents to help, or people who knew how to run it… “And Sean said, ‘I’ll run it.’ “So, at 15 last year, he ran Nippers. “I sat in the background, helping with admin. We had 60, 70 kids and he got them all there, in the groups and off they run and do their thing.
“I was really, really, proud; the club was proud of him.” Sean – who has been chosen as Bulli High School’s vice-captain for 2021 – is also a keen surf photographer.
He took the photos for this article – follow him on Instagram @seanritterphotography
Meanwhile, Sean’s younger brother, Eamon, won his award for “recruiting his mates”, giving a much-needed boost to teenage patrolling numbers.
“Eamon won Illawarra Junior Lifesaver of the Year last season for his role in attracting all his friends to come and start their surf lifesaving journey with our club,” Ant says.
“My 10-year-old didn’t win anything but we took him and three friends up to the state carnival for a weekend – they had a ball, competing and running around in the sun – it’s such a healthy sport.”
PATROLLING MEMBERS NEEDED!
Scarborough Wombarra’s Nippers – known as the Stingrays – are going strong, but the club desperately needs adult patrolling members.
“Our starting point this year was 17 patrolling members,” Ant says. “We have previously had 40 to 50, so we are really struggling this year.
“We do also have 21 kids who have done their Surf Rescue Certificate (SRC) and Bronze Medallion (BM) over the past couple of years, but they are too young to patrol on their own.
“I have asked Surf Life Saving Illawarra to do a full Sunday patrol a month, and some Illawarra clubs have indicated they would be able to help us… as I don’t want our members to burn out.
“We will get through this year with their help, but the fear is for future years and whether it is sustainable or not.
We always have this battle, but it just seems that it is at a low point right now.” To recruit new members, the club has held an open day and distributed flyers in the area.
IT’S HISTORY REPEATING ITSELF
The Ritters’ role in the surf club all started back in 2005 when Ant found a scrap of paper in his letterbox calling for volunteers.
“It was just a little ripped off piece of paper - nothing as professional as our flyer,” he says, with a laugh.
“It was a piece of paper ripped off with a ruler saying the club is in desperate need.
“I walked down here [to the club house overlooking Scarborough Beach].
“A couple of good friends of mine, Tony Harper and Lisa Carroll and myself, we came down. A guy came down and suggested he be president – he wanted to build a second storey on the surf club and a walking bridge across to the football field and all these grand plans. We voted him in. And we never saw him again.” Ant suddenly found himself elevated to club president.
“I initially put my hand up as treasurer. So in 2005 I became president – despite not growing up in the surf – I grew up in the Sutherland Shire, but not at the beach – and having no knowledge of surf club culture.” He introduced a new program that became the foundation for the club’s strong youth division today.
“We started an under-fives program – nippers only starts from under-6. We’d have up to 50 kids under-5. Typically your brothers and sisters, the parents came along, had a bit of fun, realised we needed help. And they joined. So we got some really good patrolling members throughout that time, up to around 40 to 50.” Ant did a Bachelor of Commerce at the University of Wollongong, so he knew the coast prior to moving south to Scarborough.
“I moved down in ’99, and the best thing we did as a family was to come here, to the surf club, because you meet everyone.
“The sense of community has been great for us. We’ve made – they’re better than best friends – some people we consider family now. They’ve watched my kids grow. I’ve watched their kids grow. It’s really nice.
“I presume all clubs have got that, but I know we’ve got that in a really tight-knit way.”
THE LOCATION
Scarborough is a small beach, just 0.8km long, bordered by rocks to the north and south.
The Beachsafe website rates it 6/10 (moderately hazardous), with dangers including topographic rips and strong currents.
Ant says the club is bound by the same rules as Bondi.
“Clearly Bondi have a lot more people. But the dangers are exactly the same – people swimming out, rips… so we all need the same skill-set that Bondi life savers do. That said, everyone who patrols here would rather this beach than Bondi because of the sheer volume of rescues! “I’ve never had a rescue in between the flags in summer.
“It’s a quiet beach.” Since Sea Cliff Bridge opened in 2005, Ant has seen more people discover Scarborough, something he’s happy to share. “I think it is great.
“It’s nice to see a hundred people on the beach, rather than 10. Just not too many.”
It is relatively quiet at Scarborough Wombarra Beach.
On a busy Sunday in summer, there’d be at most about 200 people, Ant says.
“It’s certainly not huge numbers, but when there’s three people on, that’s significant.
“We patrol between the flags and we also have roving patrols … All Surf Life Saving is a heck of a responsibility, there’s no doubt about that.
“This can be a dangerous beach.
“I’ve always said that if our nippers can swim out here, you can swim anywhere.”
TIME, NOT MONEY REQUIRED
“Financially we are okay,” Ant says, “but we’ve always been short for patrolling members.
It’s such a small community.” Founded in 1914, Scarborough Wombarra SLSC is sandwiched between two popular clubs at Coledale and Coalcliff.
It draws on residents of tiny villages perched on a narrow strip between the escarpment and the sea, home to 872 in Wombarra and 308 in Scarborough and Clifton, according to the 2016 Australian Bureau of Statistics Census.
“It was an ageing region, but now there’s a lot of younger families are coming into the region.
“You need three people on patrol each shift, and we do Sundays and public holidays.
So 17 divided by three is six teams, that’s every three weeks you’re at the beach.
It’s not sustainable.
“If we can get another 10 people, we’ll be fine.”
LIFE SAVING IN A TIME OF COVID
This summer also presents social distancing challenges.
“If there’s someone who’s at risk, they’ll get rescued, but it’s just the constant training that we do that’s a bit of a challenge with social distancing … eg, not being able to have two people on a board or two people in a car.
“But still the primary focus is to protect the beach goers.
And that’s what we’ll do.” A safe season takes good organisation and the club is fortunate to have a dedicated committee.
There’s Ant, the president, former CEO of Skydive the Beach, now semi-retired.
Bindi Adams is vice-president and club trainer.
Also on the committee: Thomas Summerhayes, Ian Crakanthorp, Rick Mohr, Rowena Ivers, Joanna Gullo, and Sean Ritter.
“Gary Jordan is the ATV and IRB captain,” Ant says.
“We’ve got some funding for a new IRB – that’ll be on the water this year.
“Lisa Carroll has been the registrar for the past 15 years.
We nominated her to the first female Life Member of the club, which was great.
There’s only seven others, seven men, Lisa became the eighth.
“Our committee’s really strong.
They’re all passionate about this club.
We’ve got the money in the bank, we’ve got all the resources – we just need people on the beach to help out.”
Visit www.scarboroughwombarraslsc.org
GET YOUR BRONZE! Calling grown-ups.
Want to help? There’s no need for life saving experience and club membership is free in 2020/21.
“We just need the people. We’ll teach them the Bronze Medallion,” Ant says.
“There’s a course over two days - and a bit of online with COVID.
“We’ve got an in-house trainer, Bindi Adams, and she’s running a course in November.
“They’ll learn how to do a board rescue, how to do a tube rescue, how to swim in the ocean.
And many adults can do all that – it’s just the technical component, the CPR and the resuscitation. We’ll teach them all that.
“They can then come and patrol once a month for three and a half hours.” n The club will run a Bronze Medallion course on Sunday, 15 November and Sunday, 29 November.
Contact Ant Ritter, email info@ scarboroughwombarraslsc.org
JOIN NIPPERS
Scarborough Wombarra SLSC has waived membership charges this year – families can join for free! Nipper numbers at Scarborough Wombarra range from 50 to 70 a season.
“That’s comfortable for us,” Ant says. “We’ve always pitched ourselves as the family friendly club – just come along. We do every second weekend, not every weekend, it’s for an hour and a half, not three hours.
“We don’t take point score or roll call. You just come along. We encourage the parents to come along.
“The 20-odd kids that my kids have brought in - they did water safety for us last year.
“So the parents found they could come and just sit down and watch - it was great.
“We do have the opportunity to go to carnivals. You don’t have to qualify for local branch carnivals or the state carnivals. We give them every opportunity to become a future life saver.
“We’ve got half a dozen new boards and rescue boards. So there’s plenty of opportunity for kids to try different things. And parents, of course - we need the parents!”
The Nippers proficiency swim will be on November 1 and the season kicks off at 10am on Sunday, 15 November at Scarborough Wombarra Beach.