Surf life-saving: Otago hopes rest with Laughtons

The Laughton sisters, Carla and Stephanie, are Otago's leading hopes for a medal at the national surf life-saving championships in Whakatane this week.

The four-day event begins at Ohope beach with masters events today.

Otago clubs will not exactly be represented in force but some have the potential to bring back a medal.

The Laughtons, from the powerful St Clair club, are in good form after dominating the women's events at the recent Canterbury championships.

As a crew, the pair won every race (tube, mass, assembly and single rescue) in the inflatable rescue boat competition.

Carla (25) also won the open ski race, while Stephanie (23) won the open run-swim-run event.

The Laughtons also dominated the Otago championships earlier this summer, Carla winning the ski race and ironwoman events and Stephanie claiming the board race, beach sprints, surf race and run-swim-run.

Another St Clair athlete, Joe Kemp, could be one to watch.

Kemp, who won a national title last year, dominated the under-19 beach sprint at the Canterbury championships and finished second in the open sprint behind national champion Ben Ryan.

A record number of competitors will take part in the champs at Ohope beach, and a big influx of Australian-based stars will join the fray.

Several picked up decent finishes at the Queensland state titles last weekend, including reigning New Zealand ironman champion Daniel Moodie.

Moodie finished fourth in the surf race at Kurrawa beach on the Gold Coast, behind Olympic swimmer Ky Hurst and Australian representatives Corey Jones and Dev Lahey, while he and his Northcliffe club-mates finished fifth in the teams surf race.

Moodie is in the middle of an imposing streak, having won the previous four national ironman finals.

The 22-year-old Hawkes Bay star will be looking to move ahead of former Olympic kayaker Ian Ferguson and Waimairi's Geoff Walker, both on four, and closer to Cory Hutchings' remarkable 11 ironman titles.

Having made his debut on Australia's lucrative ironman series this year, Moodie is starting to feel the pinch.

"The season's been long and I haven't had a weekend off since early January," Moodie said.

"That's starting to hit me now.

The series is over and it's almost like my body wants to start winding down."

"The strange thing is that I've been getting better results, which is weird.

"That's really made me want to put my head down this coming winter and just go for it."

Orewa's Rachel Clarke will look to build on her brilliant double last year when she collected the under-19 and open ironwoman races.

Her main competition will come from Australian-based Maddie Boon and Westshore's national representative Nikki Cox.