They are out even now in December, sea swimmers who brave the Irish waters in the depths of winter, wearing their purple-tinted skin with pride even while onlookers question their sanity.
For many Irish, swimming is for holidays – lolling on a lilo, flipping overboard for a few laps when the sun gets too intense. But outside that two-week window – or at a push a quick dip on Christmas Day – they won’t be practising their breast stroke.
Despite our unfortunate climate and memories of childhood swimming lessons in pools chlorinated to eye-stinging levels and soggy bandages floating on the water surface, nearly a quarter of a million people hit their local pool every week, according to Swim Ireland.
Making a splash
Wicklow town is home to one of the largest and most vibrant swimming scenes in the country. Wicklow Swimming Club celebrates its 72nd birthday this year and has 400 active members ranging in age from four to 75.
Wicklow has miles of pristine beaches and the town itself has good swimming amenities. A 50m pool was built on the outskirts 10 years ago. The club uses it for training during the winter months, but historically the heart of the club has always been sea swimming.
They have been particularly successful at keeping teenagers involved in swimming.
As part of the Wicklow Healthy Town Initiative, the club recently hosted an interschool gala to team up teenagers who aren’t involved in sport with those who swim regularly.
They noticed young members were most likely to drop out between the ages of 13 and 15. It was proving a tricky age group to retain as they didn’t want to be swimming with 10 year olds, but weren’t interested in swimming with the adults either. Last year a dedicated youth category was created.
“We thought it would be more fun for them if they had their own category and they jumped at it,” says club chairman John McCall. “It has been really popular and a great addition to the club.”
Teen spirit
Katie Sreenan (16) and Áine Cahill (13) are among the 200 under 18s in the club. Katie trains three hours a week during school term and swam nearly every day during this year's beautiful summer weather.
“We train during the winter in the pool and in the summer we have loads of sea races. It is really good fun,” she says.
Áine is in the new youth category and prefers sea swimming to training in the pool.
“You are not just swimming up and down: you are racing against your friends.”
On a busy Sunday morning in summer, up to 300 members can be put through the water in a series of sea races and sprints.
The club runs four major races every year. The winner of the club’s flagship Vartry race takes home a perpetual trophy engraved with the names of every winner of the race since it began 65 years ago.
“A lot of people who don’t do sea swimming look at it and think ‘you are all absolutely mad’,” says McCall. “But sea swimming for starters is not boring.
“If you get into a pool you have a perfectly flat surface, you swim up a lane and then you turn back.”
Sea swimming is much more challenging with waves, currents and jellyfish. Most people are more comfortable learning to swim in a pool.
“A lot of our races are out in very deep waters which is quite a leap psychologically.”
He admits that people can get turned off sea swimming by the temperature. What you or I call freezing, he calls “bracing”. Then there are the close encounters with seals.
McCall says they come close out of curiosity. That or lust when swimmers wear black wetsuits during mating season.
At 75, Major Brennan is the oldest swimming member of the club and one of a dozen hardcore sea swimmers who swim all year round. He joined the Wicklow Swimming Club in 1952 and his children and grandchildren are members too.
Cold water is good for you
Asked if he will be swimming all through December, he looks puzzled, as though it is the most natural thing in the world to plunge into waters that can dip to 2 degrees.
“I won’t miss one Saturday or Sunday from one end of the year to the next. The cold water is very good for you. Nearly everyone I went to school with is long dead except me and that is down to the swimming without a doubt”.
