North Curly Chatter - North Curl Curl Surf Life Saving Club

Page 2 North Curl Curl Chatter
North Curl Curl team join hundreds
in march of respect for Saxon Bird
North Curl Curl Masters take out
Aussie Gold minus bowman oar
Vale Saxon Bird—1990-2010
After 3 years of travelling west to Scarborough in
Western Australia, the Australian Surf Life Saving
Championships returned to Kurrawa on the Gold
Coast. For most competitors and keen Aussies
enthusiasts, this return to what some say is the
spiritual home of the Aussies, was keenly anticipated,
especially for the younger competitors who
had yet to experience the Gold Coast event.
As the week unfolded, the excitement and anticipation
was replaced to a mood of sorrow and
solemn bereavement, after an accident during the
U19 Ironman event on the Friday resulted in the
tragic death of Saxon Bird.
A talented and well known young member of the
Queenscliff Surf Life Saving Club, Saxon’s achievements
have been well documented—a bright young
life saver full of enthusiasm and potential, he won
the U15 and U17 Australian Surf Races, and in this
year’s NSW State Championships, he took out the
NSW U19 Ironman event.
A former student of St Patrick's College, he was in
his second year of a Business Commerce degree
at UTS, and was recently awarded a Queenscliff
SLSC university scholarship.
Masters Aussie Gold in “Bob Duff”
When it comes to the making a final at the Australian
Surf Life Saving Championships, you need to
make sure everything goes right to have a chance
of winning a medal, especially when it comes to
the surf boat arena. There are many elements
that can go against you, and you need to make
sure everything falls in place. Well our Masters
surf boat crew showed that sometimes, luck can
go against you, but you can still prevail
The crew had already done extremely well to make
the final of the 140 Years Surf Boat event at the
Australian Surf Life Saving Championships. As all
the finalists struggled to make their way out
through the growing Kurrawa surf, the North
Curly crew finally cracked a way through the
biggest of the incoming sets to head for the turning
cans, when bow man Simon Fraumeni snapped
his oar with more than half the race still to go.
Saxon was a bright young man, extremely talented
both scholastically and in sport. He was an outstanding
competitor, a loyal club member and a
great surf life saver. His loss has been felt across
the close knit surf life saving community, and he
will always be remembered as a commendable
young man.
Our thoughts and prayers go out to his parents,
Phil and Dana, and his sister Arielle.
Vale Saxon, may you rest in peace.
Normal procedure is for this crew man to evacuate
the boat to lesson the load, but given the tricky
conditions, Simon remained in the boat to help
steady the craft with the rest of the crew.
Despite the setback of only being powered by 3
oars, the boys turned the final can in slightly in
front of the fully manned Terrigal crew, and headed
for home.
With Sean Stacey guiding them onto a manageable
size wave, the boys could smell victory, and together
they worked to stay on course to arrive
safely onto the beach to the cheers of the crowd
which included many members of the North Curly
touring party. To everyone's delight, they had
beaten the odds, and once again, the "Bob Duff"
had tasted success, this time with a coveted Aussies
Gold medal.