Tintagel Surf Life Saving Club recently held its annual meeting and awards presentation at the Mill House Inn, Trebarwith.

Club president, Les Freke, told the large gathering of members and parents how delighted he was to welcome them all and thanked the committee and chair, Ted Lowe, for their efforts in keeping the club functioning during the difficulties created by the COVID pandemic.

Last summer the club met and trained for the first time since COVID and the ‘Youth’ and ‘Senior’ members successfully achieved 30 lifesaving awards. The ‘Nipper’ group also met on Friday evenings at Trebarwith where they gained considerable water skills.

During the winter the club held weekly swim training at Camelford pool and 32 children from the clubs Nipper group passed their water skills awards.

The following awards were presented by the president: The best girl Nipper, Evie Reid; best boy Nipper, Austin Murphy; The most improved girl and boy Nippers were Isla Murphy and Corey Knight; The best junior was Libby O’Neill and most improved Mae Athey; Tube Rescuer Awards were presented to: Milo Dowling, Mae Athey, Leah Athey, Niamh Jones, Karen Stratton, Phil Reed and Dylan Jorden-Shilling; Surf Life Saving Award: Abe Murphy, Bo Simpson, Tigs Coleman, Phoebe Jorden-Shilling, Stan Fletcher, Mary Dowling, Rachel Hicks, Glenn Slade and Matt Jollye.

Surf Lifeguard Award: Adam Copping, Chris Lowe, Libby O’Neill, Noah Stratfield, Alice Fletcher, Thomas Knight, Hannah Slade, Alison Chatterjea, Ted Lowe, Martin Elston, Ryan Hughes Lewis Handley, Beth Bosley and Dan Murphy.

Finally the club’s vice president, Peter Savage, presented a new Rescue Award to recognise outstanding bravery by a club member. Peter had commissioned the new Hambly Medal, named after the local coastguard volunteer who helped rescue nine crew members of the Iota which ran aground on the cliffs near Tintagel in 1893.

The first recipients of the medal were Adam Copping and Chris Lowe who rescued a swimmer in difficulties at Trebarwith.

The two club members were body surfing after a club training session and hearing the desperate shouts for help from a tourist caught in a rip current, swam out to him and without any equipment brought him to shore. The clubs president stated that without their swift actions the casualty would certainly have drowned.

Club chair Ted said that with an increase in membership this year the club was looking forward to the start of its summer training sessions at Trebarwith in May.