1,400 Jam Cove at La Jolla to Get in the Swim

For some, the La Jolla Rough Water Swim is a social event on a grand scale--1,400 friends and neighbors stepping into their Speedo suits and plunging into the ocean to swim a mile in a glorious, end-of-summer ritual.

For others, it’s a test of mettle, a dance with danger, a chance to uncage the competitive spirit. For a few, it is a habit they just can’t kick, or a challenge to charm the darkness of advancing age.

“I just thought it would be something I’d like to do and say I’ve done,” said Corinne Beach, 56, who with her husband, Ed, 61, used the swim Sunday to celebrate National Grandparents’ Day. “I guess young people today call it ‘self-actualization.’ ”

The swimmers came Sunday from as far away as Sweden and Singapore to take on the triangular course in the 55th running of what has become the biggest and best known ocean swim in the country.

Gathering on the slim thumbnail of beach at La Jolla Cove, they charged into the turquoise water in great crowds of primary-color bathing suits, racing in groups broken down by age from under 8 to 60 and up.

Gradually they spread out along the length of the course, looking from a distance like schools of dolphins. Then they broke one by one onto the beach and surged across the finish line, past an official in white trousers standing knee-deep in the surf.

“I see it like a Greek ritual,” mused Suda House, a San Diego photographer, going for her third rough-water swim survivor’s medal. “You stand out there on the beach in your Speedos and caps. It’s the purest form of man, or the individual, with Nature.”

Mark Heinrich of San Diego, one of last year’s winners, won again in the 25- to 29-year-old category with a time of 23 minutes and 42 seconds, which appeared to be the fastest in the swim. In the equivalent women’s category, Beth Lutz of San Diego won in 25 minutes and 30 seconds. Computerized results for all categories had not been completed late Sunday.

First run on a chilly summer day during the Pan American Exposition of 1916, the rough-water swim was intended as a celebration of La Jolla’s beauty in an atmosphere of “competitive fellowship.”

Held 54 times since then, it became an annual event in 1931, interrupted only by a brief loss of sponsorship in 1935, a polio scare in 1945 and shark rumors in 1959. That year, one businessman swam the course alone despite the sharks.

This year, there were triathletes in training and at least one septuagenarian. There was a man who designed piping for Sea World, an underwater photographer and a maker of “recognition products” for corporations to give dutiful employees.

Nearly everyone seemed to be a regular swimmer--9,000 to 10,000 yards a week, that sort of thing. Many said they rise before dawn for their 90-minute “masters’ swim classes,” and meet friends for Sunday morning, pre-breakfast ocean swims.

Some described themselves as competitive types; others said they had other sensations in mind. They talked about seeing schools of garibaldi and yellowtail swimming past their goggles, the clear water and the exquisite curves of the cove.

Sandy Stinson, 62, Sunday’s winner in her age group, came with her husband, John, 73. They traveled down with their coach and team from San Luis Obispo, with blue warm-up jackets plastered with championship patches.

Tossed into the pool at nine months, Mrs. Stinson wanted to swim the English Channel at 16 but was dissuaded. Six years ago, she learned the breast stroke and began competing. Now she and her husband are national champions in their age groups.

“I love to swim, I like winning, I like the challenge,” explained Mrs. Stinson, whose husband has a point when he says proudly that she looks like a kid. “I like to do my best, and this is something to prove myself.”

Bernard Drachlis, a 45-year-old Los Angeles lawyer, resumed serious swimming five years ago. “It’s reliving his youth,” his wife, Barbara, explained dryly. “He used to be a lifeguard.”

The Drachlises had been out Saturday testing his new goggles, a concession to the visibility problems of swimming in crowds. Alarmed by the newly-visible marine life, Drachlis had reported back that he would be swimming this race with his mouth closed.

Many said the biggest challenge was staying on course without reassuring white lane lines and blue walls. Some had picked out landmarks, like high-rise apartments, as compass points. Some followed the crowds, others broke away.

Then there were currents and kelp to contend with, and chop and swells some distance from the shore. Most said their only thought out there was finishing. But Lutz, the 26-year-old women’s winner, said she occasionally sings hymns to herself.

There were small, sturdy boys with close-cropped blond hair and handsome middle-aged women with goggles slung like bangles on their wrists. Contestants wore their numbers on their broad, brown shoulders, etched on in black magic marker.

Observers set up deck chairs on the balconies of nearby apartment buildings and carpeted the lawn above the cove with blankets and barbecues. Survivors’ medals went out to every finisher, and trophies to those at the top.

Sudie Schumacher, 53, of San Diego, said her entire family of six has been competing for 17 years.

After 12 years, Susan Weston confessed, “I’d rather go through the agony of doing it than the agony of giving it up.”

“It’s a way of taking a risk with a lot of adventure and very little potential for hazard,” Suda House explained. And the sharks? “Rumor is, the sharks don’t like us. They gnaw us, but they spit us out.”