HAVING to slide in behind his school desk yesterday morning, only a couple of hours after a night sailing on the Fishguard Rosslare ferry, was no problem for Irish swimming prospect Hugh O'Connor. His achievements at the Speedo British Grand Prix event in Swansea over the previous three days more than made up for any hardship.
National coach Ger Doyle, accompanied the Irish squad, was also at work, at the New Ross complex in Co Wexford, less than two hours after docking. Yet, he was dismissive of the hardships of the tight schedule and preferred, instead, to concentrate on extolling the merits of his successful competitors.
Doyle enthused, justifiably, over the feats of his successful squad.
Hugh O'Connor and Lee Kelleher, on loan to Millfield College, where she is based, were singled out by Doyle. "Hugh swam out of his skin to clean up on backstroke at 50, 100 and 200 metres," said Doyle.
"Lee was swimming in a very big Millfield team and this is good for her morale. I'm very pleased at the way she is swimming. I couldn't even hazard a guess as to how many events she swam in. She got medals, or reached finals in every event she entered.
"How the girl kept going, I don't know. I was particularly impressed in one session when she went 65 seconds in under age and senior 100 metres backstroke events, separated by only three races.
Leaving Cert student Hugh, O'Connor has discreetly opted out of next week's Glasgow World Cup Series, but will be back in action at the German meet in Gelsenkirchen on the following weekend.
His triple success on backstroke, with victory over Welsh record holder Chris Jones at 100 and 200 metres just overshadowed a commendable second place in to the Jamaican Olympian Sion Brionn on 100 metres freestyle.
O'Connor had Irish Olympian freestyler Nick O'Hare behind him, on the latter event but, unluckily, missed the chance of renewing rivalry with Brionn and O'Hare through a second start disqualification in the 50 metres heats.
Backstroke and freestyle times by O'Connor pleased both swimmer and coach. A 56.06 second 100 backstroke and a time for the 200 metres backstroke of two minutes 2.2 seconds was satisfactory, as was a 51.9 second 100 metres freestyle. (O'Hare clocked 52.3 seconds).
Kelleher is again included for next week's Glasgow World Cup meet (January 28th-29th), this time she figures in Doyle's convincing looking Irish squad of seven competitors. Olympians O'Hare and Adrian O'Connor are the senior members of a squad which also includes Graham Beegan, Paul McCarthy and huge Connacht prospects Niamh Cawley and Mary Corless.
Observing recent young Irish "squads bound for overseas competition can only reaffirm the view that there has rarely been a broader base to engender such justifiable optimism for the sport's future here.
Doyle would have wished for a larger team for Glasgow. "The difficulty is that it is a midweek competition and it means people would have to get time out of college. There are swimmers not going to Glasgow who are going to Gelsenkirchen the following weekend."
After only a few weeks as national coach, Doyle has reason to be among the most optimistic. His management team for Glasgow is completed by manager Patricia Donovan and physio Gillian Walker.
Four of the Glasgow bound team McCarthy, O'Hare, Kelleher and Adrian O'Connor will also compete in Germany three days later. At this stage, they will be joined by Hugh O'Connor, Daragh Sharkey, Michael Giles and Chantal Gibney, who has just returned from US training.
It can only be hoped that delegates to next weekend's association AGM will prove as adept as their swimmers in getting things right when confronted by some contentious motions, especially those relating to age group and national championships.
Business begins at 7.00 p.m. on Friday and resumes at 10.00 a.m. on Saturday.
Donal Barry from Cork is Peter Brennan's successor as association president.
