Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
This podcast is brought to you by M&S Food, where exceptional quality meets everyday inspiration. At M&S, they believe great food starts with great ingredients from expertly sourced fresh produce from Ireland and around the world to chef created dishes that make every meal feel special. So when they say this is not just food, they mean it.
As a chef, I've always loved the M&S approach to food, from the sourcing to the standards. It's the kind of attention to detail that really matters in a kitchen. It's food made with purpose, and that's something I can really get behind. I'm Mark Moriarty, and this is Roasted. Let's get into it. Nuala Moore is an extreme open water and ice swimmer.
She's a Guinness World Records holder, professional scuba diver and author of Limitless. We chat about growing up in a fishing family in Dingle, how her father's philosophy of the sea shaped the way she frames everything in life and what it was like to lower herself off a ship alone south of Cape Horn with the engines fading into the distance and four albatross circling overhead.
So we get obviously a lot of requests on this podcast from lots of different people. Some are really simple, some are really complicated, but nothing was like yours. So, and I quote, Chewed in cauliflower bake with a lemon and a salsa verde style sauce that can not only be used in the bake, but also as a dressing for my salads. So you pushed me to the, as much as anyone has pushed me.
So why this?
Do you know, Mark, I just needed to maximise my time with you. There was no point in giving you something that wasn't going to benefit me in the long term.
That's fair enough.
Because, yeah, I just really, I love bakes and I love clean food. And I'm having challenges with dairy. And I'm having challenges with getting stuff that isn't dairy. And I don't like packets.
And you like sort of one-pan wonders that you can stick in the oven, I assume.
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Chapter 2: What inspired Nuala Moore to become an extreme open water swimmer?
Not bad, not bad at all. You know, our evenings could be scallop with spuds in the pan or one of my favourites growing up was skate and the wings of the skate and we would have to do all the peeling of it and we'd fry it in the pan with onions.
Yeah, a lot of work in that.
Do you know what? I was talking to my neighbour the other day and we were saying, like I grew up stirring a pot of rice for four hours. You know, Mammy would put me beside the cooker and that was my job, stirring the long grain rice, which turned out to be like our ambrosia. And the other toss of the coin was the lemon meringue because my mother made the most amazing lemon meringue pie.
And I've yet to find anything to match it.
Chapter 3: How did Nuala's upbringing in a fishing family shape her perspective on life?
Really?
Yeah.
Because that was your second option.
It was.
I didn't add that to the email, but it was like, I wish I could have lemon meringue pie, but you were going to play us.
Yeah, I just kind of find sometimes if I was sitting here with the lemon meringue pie, it would just be so obvious. So I just thought, no, tuna bake, that's me.
So your mum taught you to cook?
We grew up in a hotel and I think back then, you know, we were put to bed early, obviously, because we were children and we were 26 bedrooms in a bar. And in the middle of the night, which was probably nine o'clock at night, Mammy would wake us up with mashed spuds and butter and a jug of milk.
And I remember sitting, like waking up and sitting on the side of the bed and getting your mashed spuds. and your jug of milk and back into bed again. So I think we grew up with good, healthy food. We had a huge garden and all the vegetables and stuff like that. So I think cooking was all the time in our house, yeah.
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Chapter 4: What unique challenges did Nuala face while swimming across the Bering Strait?
And again, if you go back to the sea, you know, the way that it's flat calm today and tomorrow, there's chaos, but it can be calm again. And go back to our parents and the way they described their days. It was fine. It was grand. So if you build a mountain, you climb a mountain.
And I think at the time I found when I was exposed to things that I couldn't do and then you did them, you're kind of like, well, it was actually not that hard. It was just extra effort or it required you to be strong or it required you to be courageous or brave or things like that. So I think a lot of times doing these events, I did them to be strong because I needed to test myself.
Were you proving someone or something?
I don't think you're ever proving anything to anyone. I think you're just trying to get up and be brilliant. And I didn't ever, I think very early on, In 2002, I did a very first triathlon down in Kinsale and I came last. Now, I arrived on the beach at the King of the Hill in Kinsale and I thought I was a lean, mean fighting machine. Now, I certainly wasn't.
But at that time, I used to cycle around the Wing of Kerry. I used to cycle around Sleigh Head just to get the cake back in Duncan Pottery. You know, we'd cycle over the Conner Pass. I remember when I came home from the Cayman Islands, when I was working out there, I didn't have a car. I needed to go diving. So I would cycle from Dingle to the Mahorees to go diving and cycle home.
So, like, it just was a great day out. So I went down to the King of the Hill. And now, granted, it was a very beginning of this outburst of triathlon.
For you?
Well, just in general, there were always very, very streamlined athletes at that time. And I hadn't a clue what I was doing, but I had a good bike. And I thought I really backed myself up. And I remember when I was at the end, there was like, they were going home.
There was a woman waiting for the timing chip and there was a man ahead of me who was probably younger than I am now, but I was mortified that I was behind him.
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Chapter 5: What was it like for Nuala to swim in the notorious Drake Passage?
Yeah. And then the following year I had 128 inventory. And I remember like we had no timing or anything. Like I had three, four people on stopwatches and pieces of paper and I still have them. And I remember I did them for children as well, Mark.
And like all I said to people at that point is like, can you imagine if you're in your 30s or your 20s and you're really good at something and you want to start something? How do you find a way in that you're not judged? Because it pushed me back that I was last. But what does that mean? It could have meant that I could have said that sport isn't for me.
So no, I decided, you know what, let's rock it up and let's do it our way. So I set up the Seven Frogs Triathlon and it was an Olympic distance and then sprint distance. But you know what it was? I decided that I would give the medals to the people who came last for the first three years because I felt it took more to start than it did to finish.
Because a lot of times stepping up and exposing yourself to your own judgment, maybe you are pathetic, but inside there could be just a few things that need to line up. So I came through that area of swimming from coon to ventray. I was on my own for the first four or five years. I just swam over and back. And then suddenly I realised, like, I want people here.
So I used to decide, right, OK, what if we put the weaker people in the middle? Because people would say, I can't do it. And I'd say, based on what? Like, what do you mean you can't do it? Can you swim? And if you can swim, lie on your back, look at the sky, take a minute and we'll breathe. And you see, we have this anticipation of expectation.
But if I say to you, just take your time, sing a song.
Well, it's like anything, often the hardest thing is to just start. Or the thing you dread in a day, it's the dread of starting it. But once it's started, you're like, sure, I'm on the road to ending it here.
But I think it's the expectation you place on yourself. And I think that's the big thing really, isn't it?
So do you have no expectations of yourself?
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Chapter 6: How does Nuala prepare mentally for extreme swimming conditions?
That was a marathon. But, you know, I would train in the pool. And then you realize you don't have eight hours a day to train. So if you want to train for four hours, you still need an hour and a half each way. So that's eight hour a day. So therefore you decide, OK, well, I'm going to have to swim in Venturee.
Because you're still running a business. And you're working full time. What we would describe as a normal person at the same time.
Yeah, totally. So you kind of decide at that point that, OK, so I can take the hardship. And I'll never forget, it was in April 2006. You know, you're on the beach in Venture and there was this lovely man, a really lovely, he was a deck of Ironman. And I'll never forget, he started to ask me why I was training because he had seen me.
And I had explained I was swimming around Ireland and I didn't know what it was going to be and everything. And then he said he was a deck of Ironman, 10 Ironmans back to back and And I was like looking at him and it was his eyes. It was the way that he was so focused. And it was that super... You know when that eyes go through you?
And when I explained, well, we were going to start in Donegal and we were going to swim around the country. He didn't flinch. He didn't ask a silly question.
He made a kindred spirit.
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Chapter 7: What lessons did Nuala learn about teamwork during her swimming adventures?
Yeah, but he didn't ask anything that I would have been tired of hearing. Like...
Because most people you'd meet on the beach would go, what?
Yeah.
You're doing what and why and how?
Yeah. And he spoke about the hardship. He said, you know, these are hard days, aren't they? And I'll never, yeah, I was frozen. It was in April and I was after swimming for four hours at that point and I was so, so cold. And he just said, remember, it's like these moments will make the good moments brilliant. And I just was like, don't go. Please don't go. Don't go, Ditto.
Then you go and do it.
Yeah, but I think it's fascinating. When we started our swim around Ireland, all of our swims, we trained to recovery. We trained to casualty recovery. We trained for all outcomes. We worked with amazing groups of people and they were part of our team.
Many on your team?
There was probably about 45 to 50. There were six main swimmers, five main swimmers. And then, you know, you have the land operations, you have marine rescue units, you have zodiacs, you've all these. But you're 16 to 18 hours a day on these zodiacs.
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Chapter 8: How does Nuala define success in her swimming career?
So you're bouncing. If you can imagine holding on, there's two on the boat. And can I just say on the food thing, like we had no nutritionists at that time, you know, like you got up in the morning.
Can I imagine it's one of the most important things of the whole thing?
But it wasn't, you see, we didn't have a doctor. I'd say if there was a psychiatrist, we'd have been submitted or committed or whatever. But it was fascinating. We just have a breakfast. I mean, 2006 now, Mark. Twitter was only, you know.
It wasn't even there.
Yeah. And then we got these protein bars. They were horrible. And then there was the gels and they were worse. And if you can imagine trying to swim and eat, it doesn't work.
Because how long are you in the water for at a time?
Well, probably only two or three hours at a time or an hour. It depends on conditions and we rotate. But we span probably four to six hours every day. But then you're on those boats wet and tired and you're maybe 18 hours a day and you're offshore maybe 10, 14, 15 miles.
So what do you, what do you, so you say you're doing four or five hours in the water and it's just repetitive, repetitive. What are you thinking about it?
I don't know. I was fascinated in Cork, looking up at the coast. I always loved the country from the outside in. I found that fascinating. I loved the headlands. You know, I loved the madness of the coastline of Cork. You know, you're suddenly very aware of all of the running water bay and roaring water bay and all the islands. And I found it fascinating watching.
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