Three southern Alberta athletes will be part of Team Canada heading to the Lifesaving World Championships.
“I’m so excited to get back out there again,” said Meadow Liversuch, who last competed on the international stage at the 2019 Royal Life Saving Society Commonwealth Festival of Lifesaving.
“I feel the adrenaline and it’s a lot of muscle memory, so I feel pretty confident in my swimming ability.”
The sport combines swimming with lifesaving techniques. According to eight-time Team Canada member Dallas Walker-Milan, it’s the only humanitarian sport.
“We have two kind of sides to it. We’ve got beach or surf and we’ve got pool,” Walker-Milan said. “We normally compete in pool because we don’t have access to a beach or surf, but it’s a lot like competitive swimming except we are picking up mannequins off the bottom of the pool and racing them back.”
The upcoming world championships in Riccione, Italy will be Walker-Milan’s third.
She’s joined by Liversuch and Lydianna O’Neill who will make their world championships debuts this fall.
After an inconsistent couple of years that included pushing the 2020 worlds to this year, all three are ready to return to a normal competition schedule.
“I was really shocked when they told me that I made it and I’m really excited to be able to experience this. Especially with Dallas and Meadow because I know them so well,” O’Neill said.
The last time O’Neill competed, she was participating in short-course junior lifeguard club, which is done in a 25-metre pool.
Now in her first year in long-course, swimming 50-metre-lengths, O’Neill is adjusting to the larger space.
“It’s been an eye-opener,” O’Neill said. “It’s way harder and the mannequins are full now.”
“It’s just a really big experience.”
Preparing for the first Lifesaving World Championship in four years, Walker-Milan is hopeful the three local athletes can inspire others to pick up the sport.
“It’s great that we can kind of go out there and tell our communities about it,” Walker-Milan said.
“Show our younger athletes that this is very much possible.”
The Lifesaving World Championships take place from Sept. 18 to Oct. 3.