Former Dunedin ocean swimmer Philip Rush is in Dunedin this weekend for the Zenith Swimming Club’s 50th anniversary celebrations. Sports reporter Jeff Cheshire caught up with him to discuss his continuing involvement in the sport.
If you were attempting to swim across Cook Strait, there would be few better people to support you than Philip Rush.
He holds world records for the fastest two (16hr 10min) and three-way (28hr 21min) swims of the English Channel, along with the fastest two-way swim of Cook Strait.
Only four people have completed the three-way swim of the channel, while only two have swum Cook Strait two ways.
It is at Cook Strait that he remains involved in the sport, supporting people in their attempts to swim across it, which is proving a popular challenge.
"We’re booked out in the Cook Strait until 2020," he said.
"So I can’t take anyone before then. Cook Strait’s become one of the top seven swims in the world that you need to do."
The popularity boom made it necessary to offer high-level support to those looking to undertake the swims.
"It’s incredibly challenging and you need to do some serious work and training to be able to achieve these goals."
"Also, it’s not as harsh on the body as running, and wetsuits have come in, so the novice can still come in and complete it."
About 12 to 15 swimmers took on the challenge each year and generally just one swimmer was in the strait at a time.
There were few days in a year when attempts were possible, as it was difficult to get optimal tides and weather conditions.
Rush had also been the open water high performance manager for Swimming NZ. He said it was fantastic open water swimming had become an Olympic sport. Competing at the Games would have been his "ultimate dream".
"They never had 10km races [the current Olympic distance]."
"The races we were doing, the longest was 42 miles [67.5km] and the shortest would have been about 18 [29km] or 19 [30.5km] miles.
"We used to race through America and Canada, for good prize money and, probably as far as saying that, I would have been the first professional swimmer that New Zealand had really."
He was initially coached by Dunedin’s Duncan Laing and swam with the Zenith club from about the age of 7 through until he was "19 or 20".
He then moved to Wellington looking for sponsorship, where he trained with Tony Keenan.
"On a building week we’d be doing 100 to 120km a week. We’d do that for three to four months, then we’d go racing for six weeks in America and Canada. Then after that we’d go over to the English Channel and do our campaigns over there for swimming the channel three ways."
He was looking forward to the Zenith celebrations.
"Zenith swimming club were always very supportive of their swimmers. Anything they could do in fundraising and things like that, they used to always support, no matter how small."
He started swimming in the pool, but took to the ocean.
"I was never built for pool swimming. I’d always just make the qualifying times to go away to national events, but never be fast enough to make finals.
"Then Duncan put me to swimming the open water national championships, which I started winning and it all started from there. I started at three miles [4.8km] and then finished 100-and-something miles, which was three ways across the English Channel."
Speed and being able to stick with the current were the keys to his success.
"Really you needed to keep your speed going."
"Why I was so successful was that I was originally from Dunedin, so I didn’t mind the cold outside water.
"But I had good enough speed to be able to race the tide and could swim at the same pace as the tide.
"So that’s why I was so successful in the English Channel. Some people can be too fast and some people can be too slow. The pace I swam was right on the mark and probably looking back on it now, my forte was cold water and ultra-distance."
He no longer swam in the open water, although still went to the pool to knock a few laps out.
