Taking the plunge in the Portsea Swim Classic

Taking the plunge in the

Portsea Swim Classic

As they say, there’s never more than six degrees of separation. That’s vividly illustrated by the connection between Porsche Centre Brighton and the Portsea Surf Life Saving Club, especially now that one of Porsche Centre Brighton’s own staff members has won two races at the recent Portsea Swim Classic.

Porsche Centre Brighton has been sponsoring the Portsea Surf Life Saving Club for many years, but this is the first time one of Porsche Centre Brighton’s staff has taken the plunge … and come out on top. First held in 1987, the Portsea Swim Classic is one of Victoria’s most popular open water swimming events with 1800 competitors. (More would attend, but the club puts a cap on the event for the sake of competitors’ safety. This year’s youngest competitor was just seven; the oldest was 87-year-old swimmer Patrick Galvin, who received a round of applause from the crowd after completing his 1.5-kilometre swim.

Even this year with a looming COVID-19 presence, entries for the events filled fast. One of those entrants was Rhys Mainstone, Service Advisor at Porsche Centre Brighton. It’s not his work there that has made Rhys a household name in swim circles – it’s his equally outstanding achievements in the water.

‘I made the Australian national swim team in 2009 and raced all around the world doing marathon swimming, which was events from 5km to 25km,’ says Rhys. ‘My speciality was the 10km distance. I won a World Championship Silver in the 5km teams event in Shanghai in 2011, four National 10km titles, and five World Cup 10km events and in 2015, I came third in the World Championship Series for World Cup swimming.’

Taking the plunge in the

Portsea Swim Classic

Rhys retired from professional swimming after 10 years on the Australian national swim team, but understandably found it impossible to stay out of the water. ‘I’d always heard such great things about the Portsea Swim Classic event, I had to do it,’ Rhys confirms. ‘One of my good friends is Sam Sheppard – he’s won the event a few times and he’s always said I should come over and do the event.

‘I moved over from WA in February 2020, so I’d heard about the event for many years but was never able to swim it. This year was my first event.’

Sam Sheppard, also a very well-known Australian swimmer, won the Portsea Gold event in 2016, 2017, 2019, and 2020. This year, Rhys wrested the title from Sam and won the 2.5km Portsea Gold event outright as well as the 1.5km Portsea Classic for his age group (30–39).

Not one to lie low, Rhys has already entered the Wreck to Reef event on 13 February 2021 and is looking to enter the Williamstown Open Water event in the 5km section.

Rhys made the move with his young family from Perth in WA where he was Warranty Manager at Porsche Perth after being approached by Porsche Centre Brighton to work in Melbourne.

According to Rhys, his young daughter, three-year-old Isla, seems to really like the water and he hopes that she may follow in her father’s footsteps. Perhaps she will join the Portsea Nippers program when she’s old enough, an extremely popular event run by the Portsea SLSC. The program is for those from under seven up to 13 years of age. The program has been fully booked each year (including 2021), with a cap of 600 and an eager waitlist of kids hoping to get in. The program started on Sunday 27 December 2020 and finished on Friday 8 January 2021 after participants completed seven sessions. Most sessions ran for two hours, while the under sevens complete an age-appropriate 90-minute program.

Email nippers@portseasurf.com.au for more about the Nippers program, or email contact@portseasurf.com.au for further information about Portsea SLSC. •