A wave of excitement is building in Bahrain as children prepare to compete in the nation’s very first Rookie Junior Beach Lifesaving Championship set to take place next month.
All children from the Royal Life Saving Bahrain’s (RLSB) Rookie Junior Beach Lifesaving Club are invited to take part in the event, which will be held at Sama Bay, Galali, on November 1.
The event will feature five core challenges designed to test a range of skills and abilities, with two additional events for the older age groups.
Age groups include under eight (seven years and under), under 10 (eight to nine), under 12 (10 to 11), under 14 (12 to 13), and under 16 (14 to 15).
Set up in 2021, the RLSB Rookie Junior Beach Lifesaving Club is a nine-week termly programme in Bahrain for children aged five to 16 that teaches water safety, lifesaving skills, first aid and team building and leadership through weekly sessions at Budaiya Beach and other locations.
“We are using this event to introduce life-saving sport to Bahrain for the very first time,” RLSB general manager Sam Rahman told the GDN.
“Lifesaving sport is practised all over the world, with international competitions and world championships, and our goal is to see Bahrain represented on that stage.
“At the local level, we want to create opportunities for both children and adults to get involved in lifesaving as a sport. Many skills from other sports are highly transferable, and this allows people to not only compete but also learn how to save lives.
“We want to make it clear that any child that wants to participate in the Championship but has never taken part in the rookie Junior Beach Lifesaving Club can still join this term and be eligible to enter the Championship.”
Life-saving sport is a competitive activity and aquatic discipline that develops an individual’s fitness, rescue skills and first aid abilities through a variety of events, including pool-based and surf-based competitions.
“This day is more than competition, it is a celebration of our rookie and their families,” Mr Rahman said, noting that parents, siblings and friends are all invited to attend, cheer and share the pride of seeing young lifesavers in action.
“This event also marks a significant milestone for us, one that the team has been working towards since RLSB was founded in 2016,” he said. “Next year will be our 10th anniversary.
“It shows how far we have come, the strength of our rookie programme and the bright future ahead as we continue to grow lifesaving sport across the kingdom,” he added.
All rookies from the programme will compete in five core events, with older age groups taking on two additional challenges. The core events (for all age groups) include Beach Flags, a fast-paced sprint race on sand and Run-Swim-Run, an endurance test that combines a beach sprint, an open-water swim and a final sprint to the finish line, with distances varying according to age group.
Competitors will also take part in a rescue board race, which involves sprinting with a rescue board, paddling out around a marker, and returning to the beach finish line, as well as a swimming race with a rescue tube, requiring participants to swim out and back while carrying the tube.
The final core event, the Throw Bag Challenge, gives each rookie three attempts to throw a rescue bag as far as possible along the beach.
Older rookies in the under 12, 14 and 16 category will also face two additional challenges: a CPR Challenge, in which they perform one minute of CPR on a Quality Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation manikin and a Casualty Rescue, which involves swimming out to a ‘casualty’, attached them to a rescue tube and bringing them back to shore as quickly as possible.
Each event will have individual winners, and points will be awarded based on finishing position in each event, with the highest points available for each event being 10 and the lowest being one.
The rookie with the highest combined points in their age group will be crowned Overall Champion and receive a trophy.
Registration on the day starts at 8.30am to 9am and an awards and closing ceremony will take place at 5pm.
n To register your Rookie in the championship or to enrol your child in the Rookie Junior Beach Lifesaving Club contact 32001113. Registration for the Rookie Junior Beach Lifesaving Championship closes on October 15.
julia@gdnmedia.bh
&uuid=(email))