CITY FOCUS:

Would-be lifeguards didn’t quite flood Huntington Beach shores this weekend for the Marine Safety Division’s annual tryouts, but an increase in attendance over last year is a good sign, officials said.

Sixty-eight people turned out to the tryouts at the pier on Sunday, according to city reports. Fifty-one passed all three tryout events, and about 40 will go on to the city’s training program in late March and early April, Marine Safety Chief Kyle Lindo said.

At that boot camp-like training program, potential lifeguards will be winnowed down based on their facility for life-guarding skills and the ability to interact with the public, Lindo said. Not everyone with the swimming power to pass the test makes a great lifeguard, and the next steps are a way to judge those other qualities, he added.

“We really don’t know how well tryout went until we finish the training process,” he said. “We don’t really know until the final product is on the beach.”

The numbers were a boost from last year, when only 49 showed up. Officials had expressed some disappointment with turnout then, and Lindo said his group had made strong outreach efforts this year to try to lure more people out to the testing. Still, the possible scenario of unprecedented turnout after a year in which lifeguards starred in their own TV show—“Ocean Force: Huntington Beach”—didn’t come to pass.

“We were satisfied, not ecstatic, with the turnout,” Lindo said. “It was not as much as we had hoped for, but it was more than last year, so we’re doing well.”

Everyone capable will go on to be hired, Lindo said.

While the city has more than enough lifeguards to fill all shifts, even with yearly attrition, keeping numbers even by hiring about 15 each year lets employees take needed time off and makes filling shifts easier, he said.

“It’s obviously the more, the merrier,” he said. “Last summer was a very busy summer for us.”