Shadowlands

Looking back, 5 years ago this week.

Newport Beach junior lifeguards Jeff Reed, Jenna Murphy and Heather

Pappas each collect three medals apiece at the United States Lifesaving

Association’s national championships in Daytona, Fla. Reed earns

individual gold in the C Division (ages 9-11) distance run and collects

another gold on the mixed (boys and girls) run relay. He also takes home

a bronze medal in the beach flags competition. Murphy wins the girls C

Division distance run and adds a gold medal in the mixed swim relay. She

teams with Ashley Parole to capture a silver medal in the C Division

rescue relay. Pappas, competing in the A Division (ages 14-15), joins

Jason Argnar to finish second in the swim relay and earns a pair of

bronze medals in the girls run-swim-run and the girls distance swim. Lynn

Rinek, another of the 16-member team representing Newport Beach, wins the

girls beach flags competition in Division B (ages 12-13).

A pair of teams from Newport Youth Water Polo earn top-five finishes

at the Junior Olympics in San Jose. Kyle Bean, Peter Belden and Ryan Cook

pace the offense, while Tim Birdsong and Joey Snelgrove share time at

goalie to anchor the defense as the Newport 13-and-under boys team

captures fourth place in the 24-team tournament. The scoring talents of

Jenna Barto and Erin Kelly Bates fuel Newport’s 13-and-under girls team

to a fifth-place finish among 24 teams. Kyndra Cox leads the girls squad

in assists, while Katherine Belden plays well in goal. Belden earns

All-American honors, while Birdsong and Courtney Thom receive honorable

mention. Other members of the boys team include, Steven Jendrusina, Caine

Littrell and Robert Weiner. Rounding the girls squad are Chloe Cox, Polly

Dolkas, Paige Lansing and Annie Wight.

Xeno Muller, who lives in Newport Beach and trains at the Newport

Aquatics Center, wins an Olympic gold medal in men’s single sculls in

Atlanta while competing for Switzerland. The victory is his homeland’s

first Olympic gold ever in the sport. “That was good because I had never

heard my Swiss anthem before,” says Muller. “We’re not used to having

Swiss athletes win.”

Looking back, 10 years ago this week.

Former Newport Harbor High and Orange Coast College track and field

star Sheldon Blockburger returns from the PanAm Games with a bronze medal

in the decathlon following an effort that piles up 7,262 points, some 500

off the winning score of Brazil’s Pedro Ferreira. Blockburger, who leads

after five events, finishes out with a fourth in the 110 hurdles, second

in the discus, sixth in the pole vault, second in the javelin and third

in the 1,500-meter run.

Joe Bairian of Newport Beach lands a marlin weighing 142 pounds, two

ounces off Avalon Banks near Catalina Island. Bairian, the owner of the

Bongos fishing boat, donates the large catch to “Fish for the Poor,” an

agency that delivers fish to homeless shelters. The marlin is the eighth

one caught off Avalon during the year, but only the second caught out of

Davey’s Locker in Newport Beach. Bairian’s catch is yet another highlight

of his angling career. In 1988, he wins the Balboa Angling Club’s largest

marlin caught by sportsman guide award. The following year he catches the

first marlin of the year in Southern California. Bairian is featured on

Prime Ticket’s “Water Sports Weekly” show in a special on fishing in and

around Newport Beach.

Charlie Brande, an icon of Orange County volleyball, writes his

opinion on the Pan Am Games. He begins with, “It’s becoming tough to

watch the Pan American Games with Fidel Castro acknowledging every Cuban

victory.” Brande points out that “the levels of competition are greatly

watered down with the exception of the Cuban teams.” He writes the top

U.S. women’s volleyball team plays in the NORCECA Games in Canada

instead.

-- compiled by Steve Virgen