Surf Lifesaving Training Centres

#CorkWaterSafety #CorkSurfLifesaving #OneCork

Who We are!

Surf Lifesaving has been in Ireland since 1948, Cork Surf Lifesaving is a strong and active branch of lifesaving and a dominant force at regional, national and international competitions. Our team have regularly won Junior & Senior Nipper Championships and we have a number of competitors on both the Junior and Senior Ireland squads! 

We train all year around. In the pool during the winter, and in the ocean during the summer. We have different age groups for Nippers (8-14), Juniors (14-18), Seniors and Masters (30+).  We have active beach training centres in Inchydoney, The Warren and Youghal. And pool centres in Cork city, Dunmanway and Youghal. 

Our instructors and coaches are all volunteers with WSI – Cork, which is the Cork branch of Water Safety Ireland (WSI).

What we do!

Here in Cork Surf Lifesaving club we teach people of all ages and from all walks of life how to be confident, safe and most importantly have fun in open water. 

Our competitive Nippers, Juniors and Seniors compete for places on the Munster and Irish squads. At all ages, our competitors participate in yearly Munster and All-Ireland events. And many of our older lifesavers regularly travel to international competitions. 

While swimming forms the basis for many Lifesaving sport events, these are not your run-of-the-mill swimming races. Our events and skills also include soft sand running, beach flags, rescue board races, manikin towing, fin swimming and even rope throwing!

Cork Training Centre Contacts

For more info email the Sports Officer: wsicorksport@gmail.com  

Training centres

Inchydoney & Dunmanway:  Carolann corksurflifesaving@gmail.com

The Warren: Billy (086) 8205576 or horganwilliam@hotmail.com

Youghal: Finola (086) 1060488 or wsiyoughalwatersafety@gmail.com

Cork City: Kate (087) 2809457 corkcityslsc@gmail.com

Championships Results

results can be found via the national water safety Ireland website 

National Results

Recently!

Surf Lifesaving Team Ireland 2024

Goodluck to all Irish athletes competing at the World Surf Lifesaving Championships 2024. Hosted in Australia

For these athletes it won’t be their first times on the big stage. As all have competed in both Worlds and European championships in previous years.

Pictured are the Irish athletes from Cork (all hailing from Dunmanway)

Left to right

– Katie Cotter – 2 Europeans

– Aisling Barry – 4 Europeans, 1 Worlds

(100m mannequin carry record)

– Ryan Cotter – 4 Europeans, 1 Worlds

(Mannequins relay record)

We wish each Lifesaver the best of luck and we appreciate it if you can donate anything you can towards the sponsorship. This donation will go towards travel expenses, equipment, trainings and nutrition for our athletes

Please donate via our link https://www.idonate.ie/cause/iws

We hope you have a swell time bring home some metal

The European Open Lifesaving Championships are taking place in Belgium from the 16th – 21st September.

Teams of 6 Male and 6 Female lifesavers will be traveling from Ireland to compete internationally this weekend.

We wish everyone the best of luck and especially Corks representatives, Katie Cotter, Ryan Cotter (Capt) and Aisling Barry (Capt).

Junior European Championships 

The team are home safely after an incredible week of tough competition which saw them finish 6th overall in Europe. A massive achievement for the whole team!

Best of luck to Cailim Van Dam and Katie Cotter who will be representing Ireland at the European Junior Surf Lifesaving Championships in Poland this weekend

Our national squad have travelled to Spain to compete in a Surf Lifesaving Still water championships. Competitors all over Ireland are amongst those competing for medals. We wish them the best and espeically corks Cailim Van Dam. You catch watch a livestream here https://rfessmedia.tv/#/content/

Like everyone else our activities have been limited this last two years due to covid-19 restrictions. However, we’re back up and running in full force this summer across the county!

Last summer our Juniors, Seniors and Masters competed for the first time in two years in the National Championships in Kilkee, Co. Clare. 

Our Juniors and Seniors had a fantastic weekend with 4 of our Juniors and 5 of our Seniors qualifying for the spots on the Irish Squad

In February we had our first pool competition since 2020 at the National Stillwater Championships in UL Pool, Limerick and again our Juniors and Seniors did not disappoint! There were medals and smiles all round.

Our Nippers had their chance to shine at the Munster Nipper Stillwater championships in UL Pool, Limerick in March 2022. We brought just shy of 40 Nippers and 36 of them qualified to represent Cork in the National Championships in the NAC, Dublin this past April.

Very impressive medal hauls and PBs across the club this winter especially considering the limited pool time and space available to us post COVID-19 lockdowns.

In May Lifeguard Maxi from Bondi Beach, Australia came to visit Cork City Library. He gave our nippers a very informative water and fire safety talk and afterwards held an interactive BLS demonstration. We look forward to welcoming Maxi for a beach session in the future and maybe we will visit him in Sydney!

This will be our first full year of competitions since 2019 and we will be hosting the Munster Nipper and Junior competition on the Front strand in Youghal. We hope to retain some of our titles such as the National Nipper Beach Perpetual Trophy (Winners 2014, 2015, 2016, 2019) and regain the Masters’ combined Pool and Sea National Surf Lifesaving Trophy (Winners 2016, 2017, 2018)

Each year, as a celebration for all the hard work our lifesavers and their support teams (parents and anyone at home) have done over the session, we have an end of summer carnival to show how much they all mean to the Cork Water Safety family!

Last year’s club carnival was the first to bring all of centres from across the county together on the Warren strand, Roscarbery. The weather didn’t stop our nippers and coaches a like from having a blast. Prizes on the day were sponsored by our friends in Jelly fish surf shop, Clonakilty, The Clonakilty Park Hotel, Clonakilty and the Edge Sports, Cork city.

Finally our Juniors, Seniors and Master will be representing Cork SLS in the World Championship in Riccione Italy this September, we can’t wait! Watch this space for more pics and updates to come!

A few little things!

We ask for you to be able to swim 50 metres in the sea unaccompanied, and tread water for at least a minute. Everyone, from nippers to masters are tested on this. If you’re not at this standard yet, we recommend that you take part in a WSI-Cork swim week to improve your swimming.

As long as you pass the above assessment, you can come train with us. However, to compete for Cork at inter-county level (and above) you must complete an WSI Safety 2 course, or WSI Surf 3 course. WSI Safety courses are run at many local beaches around the county during the summer swim weeks and in pools during the winter. The WSI surf courses are run as part of our beach training during the summer.

Everyone participating in our lifesaving training sessions must register with WSI.

In 2022 Nippers must turn 8 by December 31st 2022 (Born in 2014). We have no upper age limit!