And, in the process of breaking through for their first State IRB Championships, the South Coast club has ended Caves Beach’s 11-year reign on the title.

The championship triumph on July 2-3 in Mollymook followed hot on the heels of Kiama Downs winning their fifth straight NSW IRB (Inflatable Rescue Boat) Premiership championship.

But their latest State championship victory was ‘’something special’’ for Kiama Downs IRB team manager Steven Guy.

‘’Our State Championships curse has been lifted,’’ an ecstatic Guy said.

Kiama Downs SLSC finished with 79 championship points, 17 more than their closest and main rivals, Hunter club Caves Beach.

Guy said despite this, every race was closer than expected and a host of clubs picked up medals.

“The racing throughout the whole weekend was really tight. In the Premiership, we dominated the rounds pretty convincingly but in the Championship a lot of competitors came out of the wood work which was great to see and made it interesting,’’ Guy said.

Nevertheless Kiama Downs’ open male team did the clean sweep winning all four gold medals, while their under 23’s finished with two gold and the over 35’s took home a gold medal in the Rescue event.

‘’Most of our medals from the weekend actually came from our B teams so it’s a good indicator of the depth we have as a club,” Guy said.

‘’Having two or three teams entered in each event is what gave us the edge over our opposition.’’

Two Illawarra clubs finished in the top 10, with Thirroul SLSC (24 points) placing sixth and Woonona coming seventh after picking up 17 championship points.

In an added bonus for Thirroul, its open female team continued their outstanding form over the weekend, blitzing their opposition in the Mass, Tube and Teams events.

Kiama Downs outstanding State Championships saw two of its members selected in the NSW team to contest the Australian IRB Championships in Mollymook from July 22.

Kiama Downs SLSC will also join other NSW clubs competing in the Interstate Championships at the same venue.

‘’Having the State Championships at Mollymook has certainly been a good warm up for us to get a feel for the conditions. Hopefully we can all do our fellow NSW surf lifesavers proud,’’ Guy said.

‘’We came second at Aussies last year behind North Burleigh SLSC who are going to be very hard to beat but if we can pull off a few wins it would be good to finish in a similar position again.’’

The Interstate Championships kick off on Friday, July 22 with the Australian Championships beginning in the afternoon and continuing over the weekend at Mollymook SLSC.