Mairangi Bay wins BOP IRB Long Haul

Mairangi Bay Surf Life Saving Club took out the Bay of Plenty Inflatable Rescue Boat (IRB) Long Haul race over the weekend for the second year running.

The annual event is set over five stages to test the crews with physically and mentally demanding challenges as they race along the 95km coastline from Ohope Beach to Mount Maunganui Main Beach.

Crews started together and raced side-by-side to each of the five stages at Matata, Pukehina, Papamoa, Omanu and Mt Maunganui where they were required to carry out a number of challenging exercises such as assembling and breaking down their equipment and performing rescues.

Crews had 12 minutes to recover before the next mass start set them on their way to the next stage.

After three and half hours of racing, the 12 teams finished within three minutes of each other with Mairangi Bay ahead of Papamoa's Under 21 crew and United North Piha in third.

Surf Life saving New Zealand Sport Manager Mark Inglis says it was a great day of high speed, adrenaline-filled racing.

"The challenges are designed to test Surf Lifeguards' ability to respond to a callout or rescue by quickly setting up the Inflatable Rescue Boat (IRB) and heading out onto the water, he says.

"A lot of the details around the challenges, and the race itself, were withheld from the competitors until race day to add to the challenge and the teams handled it very well."

Results: Accumulated time difference over the five stages

Mairangi Bay Delta 01:33
Papamoa Young Bucks 03:08 (U21 category) United North Piha SLSC 03:35 Mairangi Bay Sharks 04:38 Papamoa Grumblys 06:27 Whiritoa Open 12:58 Waipu Cove 13:12 (U21 category) Papamoa Poachers 13:31 (U21 category) Pauanui/Whiritoa combined 17:09 (U21 category) Pukehina SLSC 20:03 (Mixed category) Mairangi Bay PDJ 23:34 Omanu Beach SLSC 28:03 Whakatane SLSC (Mixed category) Withdrawn DNF stage 2

For more information, please contact:

Lisa Smith, Media & Communications Manager, SLSNZ
Phone 0276 488 823
Email lisa.smith@surflifesaving.org.nz