A shore thing

Competitors make waves in Jersey at lifeguarding's Super Bowl

By G. Patrick Pawling
Special to SI.com

CAPE MAY, N.J. –- In the fog of a muggy summer day in New Jersey, the ocean looked greenish-gray from the vantage point of this, the southernmost New Jersey shore town. But the beach was a very deep shade of cool.

Some 800 lifeguards from around the country descended upon Cape May this past weekend for the Super Bowl of beach patrol competitions, the United States Lifesaving Association National Lifeguard Championships.

They swam in strong currents. They ran on soft sand. They rowed, hand-paddled and kayaked through shoulder-high beachbreak. They saved "victims." They ranged in age from 16-year-old Brandon Pomerantz of Cape May (best finish: 17th in the run-swim-run) to 76-year-old George Feely of Ocean City, Md. (11th in swimming).

As usual the team competition became a confrontation between the svelte and deep Los Angeles County squad (think lifeguarding's version of the Yankees) and gritty East Coast powerhouse Monmouth County. It's difficult to call LA vs. Monmouth a rivalry, because that implies that the two teams trade wins. Monmouth hasn't won the USLA nationals team championships since 1983; heading into this year's competition Los Angeles had won 16 consecutive large team titles. Even Joe Frazier knew not to come out in the 15th the last time he fought Muhammad Ali. But pride runs almost as deep here in the lifeguarding community on the East Coast as does the Atlantic Ocean. Monmouth almost always finds a way to stay close to LA.

Monmouth's ability to hang with the its West Coast brethren is somewhat surprising. Yes, the "home" team can usually deliver more competitors in the USLA nationals (which are held in different cities each year) because it costs less, but lifeguarding is a full-tine profession in places like Los Angeles and San Diego and Florida. Here in New Jersey, where the winters exhibit a true chilling effect on ocean swimming, the beach patrols are only officially active during a small fraction of the year. Yet the part-timers produce great surfboat rowers, swimmers and talented individual athletes who come up big against the Californians, who tend to come at them –- pun intended –- in waves, especially in the upper age ranges.

The USLA nationals feature guys like Joel Gitelson, 55, who is a defector of sorts. He guarded on New York's Long Island from '66 to '79, then moved to Los Angeles County, where he's a full-timer on the beach now. And there he was on Saturday, mustache white as the foam on a closeout wave, winning Ironman competitions in the veterans age group.

Speaking of defectors, the Miami beach patrol features two. But these two crossed more than just a few state lines.

Just over 10 years ago, Robert Vento set off in a raft made from canvas and inner tubes from Cuba. With him were his father, a friend, a few gallons of water, some hard-boiled eggs and sugar. A little more than three days later they saw a small fishing boat with an American flag on the stern. It was sitting off the coast of Islamorada, Fla. The skipper shouted in a language Vento didn't yet know, English, and showed him some things he surely did understand: A big smile and cold cans of Coke.

Vento ended up in Rochester, N.Y., but two artic winters there convinced Vento, now 31, that there had to be a warmer way, so he made his way back to Miami, where he is now a guard and a rower. His journey brought him to Cape May over the weekend, where he finished well back in the surfboat competition. He didn't seem fazed.

"Here in the United States, life is very beautiful," he said. "I am so thankful. It is good to be here. I am very glad. I cannot say anything bad."

Tatiana Valdes, 31, also of the Miami beach patrol, was an Olympic-level kayaker back in Cuba. During a trip to Mexico she slipped away to hide with a friend for a week before sneaking across the border to Texas. Her best result in Cape May was a third-place finish in the Open Surf Ski event, in which competiters use a kayak-like vessel.

"It is a better life here in many ways," Valdez said. "In Cuba most people don't have any opportunities."

In the cold-winter states like New Jersey, guards tend to be teachers who come back to the beach year after year, regular as the tide. And so, in a sense, lifeguard competitions –- local or national -- are reunions, a place where gray hair and blond hair can coexist easily and stories are told, re-told -- and created too.

"It really is like a fraternity," said Buzz Mogck, captain of the host beach patrol in Cape May Beach. "It's the kind of thing that never leaves you, that camaraderie. It's a feeling you have, and you love it –- the experience of saving lives, having helped someone."

But no guard worth his sea salt at the weekend's competition would deny the sandy truth: The beach is a great place to be. Wherever earth meets ocean, something good is going to happen.

Conversation overheard between two USLA officials:

"How'd it go last night?"

"Same as the night before that and the night before that. Lots of cold beer."

Cape May is a distance from everything else in New Jersey, and maybe because of that it is unlike any other New Jersey beach town. It owns an artsy rhythm, and its downtown -- a national historic landmark –- is stuffed with thriving bed and breakfasts based in huge 200-year-old Victorian houses. Presidents and generals have made a point to stop here.

Some of the town's less-famous visitors include Dave Pierson and Tom McLoughlin, who know a few things about history as well. Both 50, they started guarding together 36 years ago in Sandy Hook, N.J. One can safely assume something happened that summer that wedded them to the beach. One can also assume that only death will part from it. Both became teachers. Both are still on the job. Both have sons who are now on the same beach patrol. They've been rowing together for 35 years. They finished second in the veterans' surfboat doubles. They are perpetually stoked.

The East Coast's cornerstone was fabled Matt Nunnally, 33, head swim coach at La Salle University. Nunnally was chosen as this year's top male athlete based on points gathered during the competition. He just plain does everything well, and he's one of the reasons Monmouth stayed close. But when the team scores were added up, it was another win for Los Angeles County. Monmouth finished second. In third place: the host, scrappy South Jersey.

The victorious Los Angeles team was gracious.

"There were some years when it was a little heated but Monmouth is a class act and they have some great athletes," said Mike Cunningham, a captain who works out of Hermosa Beach, Calif. "They could beat us any year. "

Hey, the tide turns twice a day around here.