The stage and screen actress Siobhan McKenna used to locate herself by the band stand on Dun Laoghaire Pier and shout encouragement to her talented son.
"Suas Donnacha, suas Donnacha," she was known to call. And so the story goes. The Irish Times Harbour Swim brings more than splashes and while the Irish Olympian of the 1968 games in Mexico, Donnacha
O'Dea does not compete anymore, Tony O'Brien from the Millennium Swimming Club suitably got the crowd shifting when he won his first ever sea race.
"I've been sea swimming for four years now and I've never won a race. You might as well win a big one when you do," said the 39-year-old, who is originally from Wexford.
O'Brien caught and over hauled 67-year-old Jackie Carney, who for some time threatened to be the hero of the day in the mile-and-a-half swim around the pier.
In truth there was a frisson of excitement that the oldest man in the race may just hang-on but O'Brien and a churning mass of fast finishers swallowed up the spunky veteran despite the winner taking an unnecessary detour towards the end which had him heading towards the car ferry rather than the lifeboat slip.
The extra fifty metres he added by taking the wrong line might have cost him dearly.
"I just managed to get back in time," he said afterwards. "I would have died if I'd lost it there."
The harbour race has been staged since 1931 and yesterday's entry of 198 men was a record turnout. The fastest swim of the day came from Shane Moraghan who completed the course in 28 minutes 45 seconds.
The Half Moon swimmer started the handicapped race 17 minutes 40 seconds after the first swimmer left dry land. The front runners had already passed the half-way mark when he took his first stroke.
The women's entry too provided a record number of 93 entries with the newly qualified lawyer from Claremorris, Karen Molloy, taking first place. Over a shorter course of 1,400m, Molloy beat mother of six and English Chanel swimmer Ann McAdams to the slip. Although McAdams from the Phoenix Swimming Club was pushing hard along with a group of closing swimmers, Molloy held 20 metres of water between them with a strong finish.
"I took a bad line at the beginning," she said of the course, which went out to two marker bouys before returning. "I saw that the bouy was well over from where I was. I didn't think I could do so just kept my head down and didn't look around. The conditions were lovely. The water was warm and not wavey."
Coldness is one of the varying factors sea swimmers have to endure with many of the competitors in the water for over half an hour. Skinny sea swimmers don't appear to exist.
At the turn from the lighthouse at the end of the pier the tide was also against the swimmers making the return leg even more demanding.
Molloy (27), who made a 120 mile round trip to Dublin to compete in the mandatory preharbour swims, only began competing in sea swims last year. Yesterday was her fifth outdoor swim this season.
The fastest net time for the women's race came from former winner Rachael Lee from the Guinness Swimming Club with Dublin SC picking up the team prize. Millennium won the team prize in the men's event.
