By DOUG FERGUSON, LIFESAVING SPORT COMMISSIONER

If you’re a sports enthusiast, you likely watched the world’s best compete at the 2004 Olympics in Athens, Greece. The Olympic Games are staged by the International Olympic Committee (IOC). The IOC is an international non-governmental non-profit organization whose primary responsibility is to supervise the organization of the summer and winter Olympic Games.

The current Olympic Games program includes 35 sports and nearly 400 events. And to promote the Olympic Movement, the IOC recognizes some sports that do not appear on the Olympic Games program, including well known sports such as golf, rugby, surfing and water skiing.

Recently, the International Olympic Committee to reduced the number of non-Olympic sports it recognizes from 30 to just nine. I am pleased to announce that Competitive Lifesaving was one of the nine sports that survived the cut. (The Commonwealth Games Federation also recognizes Competitive Lifesaving as a sport.) Lifesaving is indeed on the way up on planet earth.

Competitive Lifesaving should not, and will not, take priority over saving lives. But IOC recognition is significant and can bring great benefits to lifesaving, including new tools to attract participants to lifesaving training programs, promotion of our lifesaving mission and attracting the attention of donors and sponsors in support of drowning prevention.

The IOC recognizes the International Life Saving Federation (ILS) as the governing body for competitive lifesaving. The Lifesaving Society represents Canada in ILS and as the governing body for competitive lifesaving in Canada, the Lifesaving Society promotes competition as a training incentive and a showcase for the abilities and professionalism of our lifeguards.

The Society now hosts national championships for junior (under 16 years of age), senior (over 16), and masters competitors in both the pool and open water. In addition, from coast to coast, provincial branches of the Lifesaving Society are sanctioning a record number of local competitions.

Canadians are becoming increasingly competitive in international lifesaving competitions, not just in the Simulated Emergency Response Events - in which we'd expect Canadian lifesavers to be strong - but also in the pool and open water race events.

Only competitors participating in Canadian championships are eligible for selection to Canada’s National Lifesaving Team, which represents our country in national teams competition at events such as the World Lifesaving Championships and the Commonwealth Lifesaving Championships.

But you don’t need to be a member of the national team to compete internationally. In fact there are more participants in the Interclub division than the national teams division.

I urge all members of the Lifesaving Society to take notice of the continuing development of “our” great sport – the only sport in which participants first learn the skills for a humanitarian purpose and only later use them in competition.

Yours in drowning prevention,

Doug Ferguson,
Lifesaving Sport Commissioner