Good Night for LBI Beach Patrols at Seaside Park Tournament

It’s a pretty good ride from Long Beach Island to Seaside Park but it was worth it for the three LBI beach patrols that took part in the annual Seaside Park Lifeguard Tournament Monday night. Ship Bottom, Harvey Cedars and Surf City grabbed the top three spots in the 7-team event that featured swimming, rowing, paddling and running on the N Street beach.

Ship Bottom claimed three of the nine events, finishing first in the 1000 foot row, boat relay and paddle relay to finish with 43 points with Harvey Cedars coming in second (34pts) and Surf City third (31 points). Host Seaside Park finished fourth followed by Island Beach, Lavallette and Ortley Beach.

Harvey Cedars finished second

The members of the winning Ship Bottom team were Reid Sinkerson, Pat Gazzilo, Alex Rech, Jordan Aughenbaugh, Matt Heiser, Marc Wagner, Tommy Smith, Ty Nagel, Shawn Hannon, Jonny Skolnick, Hannah Fodor, Haley Ullinger and Tracey Hemmerle. Hannon and Smith head up the SBBP competition crew.

Victorious Ship Bottom Beach Patrol

The SSP Tournament ran very smoothly under the direction of beach patrol captain Mike Veracierta. Sponsors were The Sawmill, B&B Department Store, Surf Taco and the Seaside Park Service Center.

Host Seaside Park featured a strong contingent of female lifeguards

SSP veterans Joe Gomulka and Jason Homer get ready for the boat relay

LOOK: Here are the 50 best beach towns in America

Every beach town has its share of pluses and minuses, which got us thinking about what makes a beach town the best one to live in. To find out, Stacker consulted data from WalletHub, released June 17, 2020, that compares U.S. beach towns. Ratings are based on six categories: affordability, weather, safety, economy, education and health, and quality of life. The cities ranged in population from 10,000 to 150,000, but they had to have at least one local beach listed on TripAdvisor. Read the full methodology here. From those rankings, we selected the top 50. Readers who live in California and Florida will be unsurprised to learn that many of towns featured here are in one of those two states.

Keep reading to see if your favorite beach town made the cut.

Categories: Articles