John McCarthy

From Openwaterpedia
John McCarthy, author of Swimming Easter Island
Swimming Easter Island, the first book published by Plastic Oceans International
Swimming Easter Island was nominated for the 2019 WOWSA Awards in the World Open Water Swimming Offering of the Year category
John McCarthy created a compilation of crossings between Anacapa Island and the California mainland achieved throughout 2023 for the Santa Barbara Channel Swimming Association annual awards dinner

John McCarthy is an open water swimmer, surfer, freediver, entrepreneur, environmentalist, and award-winning author from Durban, South Africa and founder of the Bomb Surf and Ocean Child. He provides clients with unique adventure experiences, teaching them how to be comfortable in and better connect with the ocean and land.

Open Water Swimming Highlights

Against The Current Trailer


Plastic Oceans International produced the 58-minute documentary film Against The Current about the unprecedented 60 km circumnavigation swim around Easter Island by South African open water swimmer Sarah Ferguson in 19 hours 8 minutes in March 2019. Narrated by Matthew Modine.

Swimming Easter Island

He wrote the book Swimming Easter Island, his eyewitness account of the global effort that resulted in South Africa’s Sarah Ferguson becoming the first person to swim around the perimeter of the Easter Island, known locally as Rapa Nui. It was nominated for the 2019 World Open Water Swimming Offering of the Year category.

2019 World Open Water Swimming Offering of the Year Nomination

John McCarthy’s Swimming Easter Island was nominated for the 2019 World Open Water Swimming Offering of the Year award as follows:

Easter Island sits remotely out in the southeastern Pacific Ocean, located 3,512 km from Chile. Isolate and so far away from her native South Africa, Sarah Ferguson was drawn to the challenge of swimming 60 kilometers around the World Heritage Site. She was accompanied by a large crew that included surfer and ocean waterman John McCarthy, a fellow Durbanite. The renowned author wrote Swimming Easter Island, an 88-page book that gives his colorful first-person account and backstory of her 19 hour 8 minute journey where he served as her lead planner, navigator and safety officer. The book retells the swim from various perspectives giving insight that can come only from an eyewitness who understood the dangers and risks she faced. For bringing to life this harrowing solo swim with dramatic photos, maps and illustrations, for describing the core reasons for doing this swim as an eco-warrior and an ambassador for Plastics Ocean International, and for documenting an unprecedented Guinness World Record marathon swim for subsequent challengers and future generations, the book Swimming Easter Island by John McCarthy is a worthy nominee for the 2019 World Open Water Swimming Offering of the Year.

The Sexy Ugly Beautifuls

The Sexy Ugly Beautifuls, is a rock 'n' roll collection of ocean-infused adventures.

Santa Barbara Channel Swimming Association Board of Directors

  • Peter Hayden, President serving since 2015; President since 2023
    • Peter is the Sr. Vice President of Engineering for a Los Angeles based commercial real estate developer. He awakens at 4:30 every weekday morning to commute 60 miles to LA’s Fairfax District and fit in a 2-hour workout with the Meridian Swim Club Masters before heading across the street to work. On the weekends, he can usually be found swimming in Laguna Beach waters with the Oak Streakers.
    • A Los Angeles native, Peter has been a competitive swimmer since age 8, and until 2011, had never done anything longer than a 2 mile pier swim. That changed in 2012, when he completed the 6-mile Semana Nautica and the 12.6-mile Distance Challenge. In 2013, Peter became the 283rd person to successfully cross the Catalina Channel. In 2014, Peter received the Marathon Swimmers Federation’s Yudovin Award, which honors the single most adventurous swim of the year, for his record-setting circumnavigation of Anacapa Island, followed immediately by crossing the Santa Barbara Channel to the Ventura coastline, a total distance of approximately 24 miles.
    • Peter coached the Pacific Aquatic Masters while attending the University of Pacific in Stockton, California, and married his star swimmer, Carol Hayden. Peter and Carol live in Laguna Hills, California; their two sons live in Oakland, California and Gutau, Austria.
  • Amy Appelhans Gubser, serving since 2025
  • Jane Cairns, Vice President serving since 2010
    • Jane grew up swimming on the Mission Viejo Nadadores swim team from 1978-1988. She graduated from UC Santa Barbara with a BA in Environmental Studies in 1993 while swimming on the Gauchos swim team for 4 years. Jane was named SPMA Open Water Swimmer of the Year in 1997. She has participated in numerous Catalina Channel crossing relays and is a member of the team that still holds the fastest CCSF single and double crossing records. Jane is also a veteran paddleboard racer. She has raced the Catalina Channel 15 times, 8 of which in the 32-mile Catalina Classic and placing 5 times in the men’s division. She has also raced the 32-mile Molokai paddleboard race 3 times.
    • Jane is very involved in the aquatic community in Santa Barbara. She helps run a weekly summer ocean swim race and has been the director of the Santa Barbara 6-mile ocean swim race for the past 10 years and still holds the women’s course record. She is currently getting back into swimming shape to hopefully soon start training to swim the Catalina Channel solo.
  • Karina Garcia, serving since 2021
    • Karina grew up in Ventura County and continues to live there. She works for Ventura County Human Services Agency. Karina joined a local swim club at age 11 and swam through high school. After college and then living abroad in Chile for a few years, Karina returned to swimming joining the Ventura County Masters. There she made friends with a group of open water swimmers (Deep Enders) who dragged her to the beach one Saturday morning. Despite being a little scared, Karina soon fell in love with ocean swimming because of the focus on endurance and the excitement of the open water. After learning about the accomplishments of her Ventura friends, she wanted to give it a try as well. Karina’s first channel swim was the Catalina Channel in 2016 and since then she has set a new goal each year.
  • Gary King, serving since 2023
    • Gary grew up on the beach in Southern California and enjoyed ocean sports such as swimming, surfing, snorkeling, SCUBA diving, and sailing.
    • Gary spent four years in the U.S. Navy, received his BS from Pepperdine, and currently lives with his wife, Kathi, two daughters, and two granddaughters in Simi Valley, California.
    • Gary is a Lifetime Member and Observer for both the Santa Barbara Channel Swimming Association (SBCSA) and the Catalina Channel Swimming Federation (CCSF), a USMS Level 2 Coach, and a USMS Open Water Certified Safety Director.
    • As a triathlete and open water swimmer since 1980, his highlights include Coronado 12 mile, Seal Beach Roughwater Swim 10 Mile, Santa Barbara 6 mile (3 times), Catalina Channel Relay, Alcatraz (17 times), and SCAR Canyon Lake 9 mile.
    • Recently retired from his career in Quality Management, Gary now focuses on his passion to mentor swimmers to help transitioning from pool to open water, dropping wetsuits for skins, navigating, open water racing, feedings, etc. Gary organizes and mentors a group of swimmers in Ventura County for ocean swims several days per week with distances ranging from 1-3 miles per day.
  • John McCarthy, serving since 2025
    • John is Vice President and serves on the board of a Santa Barbara based R&D company. He trains in the ocean year round in the Santa Barbara area.
    • John learned to swim as a kid in the ocean at Camps Bay South Africa and Laguna Beach, California, but never competed in swimming. Instead he did cross country running, volleyball indoors and beach, collegiate ultimate frisbee, and then as an adult USCF road race cycling. Eventually there was a bike crash that forced a long rehabilitation, and that eventually became pool swimming with Sundays in the ocean.
    • In March 2020 the loose band of Sunday ocean swimmers formed Swim Wild Santa Barbara and organized a schedule of ocean swimming that brought a large number of people in the area into ocean swimming every day of the week. Soon SBCSA board member Jane Cairns joined the group. With all of that ocean swimming swim distances became longer, one thing led to another, and…with Jane Cairns, John has done a circumnavigation of Anacapa Island, a two-way crossing of the Anacapa Passage between Anacapa and Santa Cruz Island, and the Anacapa to mainland crossing of the Santa Barbara Channel.

External links

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