Inside the Rhode Island Lifeguard Tournament

Photograph by Gansett Photography

Every year in the first week of August, beachgoers turn out to watch Rhode Island’s summer finest compete in sand and surf. The Rhode Island Lifeguard Tournament features six nights of competition to test the state’s surf-certified teams, from the swells of Narragansett to the gentle shores of Roger Wheeler State Beach. “It’s a long history, a legacy event,” says Brian Guadagno, tournament director. “It really celebrates the camaraderie, the lineage of lifesavers here in the Ocean State.” Though no one seems to know exactly when it started, the tournament has been around at least since the 1960s, when events included a parade and a torpedo buoy race. Today, lifeguards compete in a variety of rescue-adjacent skills, from rowing and swimming to retrieving victims during water rescues. Guadagno, who also serves as senior lifeguard captain at Narragansett Town Beach, began competing in 1995. He says the event serves as an important recruitment tool, especially as beaches have struggled to hire new lifeguards nationwide. “Oftentimes it’s overlooked how much responsibility there is in the job and how much people are tasked to do,” he says. “This tournament is an opportunity to showcase the skills, the effort, the energy that lifeguards put into their craft, and that they take it very seriously.” Regardless of whether they harbor lifeguard aspirations, Guadagno encourages families to come out and cheer for their favorite beach’s team. This year’s tournament runs Aug. 4–9, with events starting around 6:30 p.m. each night and locations announced closer to the event. “It’s a window into a ritual that’s been going on for seventy years,” Guadagno says.