Al’s Swimming

What a crazy week it turned out to be! Having been down to Dover for the early part of the week and then returning because we decided to be patient and wait for better conditions. I got a text from my pilot at 10am on Thursday morning

‘U to start tom morning at 1am mate ? Midnight at boat?’

I checked the wind and it was looking great for that night and the next day, so decided to go for it. Also quickly checked to see if my support crew could make it. Unfortunately Steve and Matt couldn’t; Gowyn was uncertain. I decided I was going to do it anyway, so I booked a flight down to London Gatwick for 2pm - charged home and got my passport (you’ll see why later).I arrived at Gatwick at about 3:30 and then had to catch the convoluted train system down to Dover. I was relatively calm at this stage.

It proved to be a rather awkward time to depart, because it wasn’t really worth getting a room, so I slept for a couple of hours in hotel Vauxhall Vectra (I had left him down there earlier in the week). Luckily my mates had started to hear word that I was swimming, so calls and texts started to pour in. Eventually my phone cracked it and refused to operate…for the rest of the weekend (so apologies to those who didn’t get a reply). Later that night, Gowyn and Jase Parkin arrived in Dover and I gave them a run down of what to expect and how to be best prepare as support crew. Luckily Ali (my pilot) had requested an experienced observer, Sam Jones, to organise feeds.

We got to the marina at midnight and found the gates open, so went in and unloaded the car. Gowyn returned it to the hotel, whilst at the same time the police turned up and questioned us about a suspicious car… and why we were here.

“Just about to swim the channel”

“As you do”

Ali arrived not long after and we packed the boat. The weather was still holding up well, so everything was looking great. Leaving the dock was probably the most nervous I got. The lads were all joking about and that really helped take my mind off it. The ride out of the harbour walls and then down the coast were vastly different to that of the relay or even Steve’s swim - it was relatively flat. I started to get ready and Jase applied the Vaseline under my arms and back of my neck. This was to stop the chaffing.

Once the boat had got within about 30 metres of shore, I jumped and swam in. I remember consciously trying to relax and just let the waves take me in. I walked up the beach turned around and got the signal. I tried swimming slow, but with the adrenaline flowing through my body this proved to be easier thought than done. I believe my stroke rate in the first hour was the low 70’s.

So what do you think about in the pitch black? I remember watching the full moon - for ages! And also trying to find stars in the sky (it was quite a clear night). I watched the boat a bit to see if I could see anyone. I saw Jase or Gowyn wrapped up really warm, but it didn’t bother me. I knew that the water was considerably warmer that what I had trained in and also that the speed I was going would keep me warm. You must also bear in mind that water holds it’s heat a lot better than the land, so even though it was quite cool, the water was only say a degree colder than it had been during the day.

I also remember seeing a lot of ferries during the 2nd and 3rd hour. They looked amazing all lit up. I remember one in particular, that seemed to stay beside me for ages. There was also the occasional jellyfish that crashed past and ’said Hi’, nothing like the one in Granton, but it was nice to know I had company. Interestingly, Radio Al didn’t seem to want to play. I tried to remember a couple of songs, but I just couldn’t get into a rhythm with them - not even Willie Nelson’s ‘On the Road Again’, which had been a favourite for the past week.

As a swimmer swims relatively slow compared to a boat, the boat has to sometimes rev up and go ahead of the swimmer and then slip into neutral and wait for the swimmer to catch up. This happened a couple of times and each time I would ‘collide’ with the boat, because I couldn’t see it. They were politely asked to switch the lights on when they went ahead. Looking back, it was also my first hint to my right bias.

We had decided that for the first three hours that I would feed on the hour and then we would go on the 1/2 hour after that. At the end of the third hour, I was quite excited because it felt like we were on the home straight. I was swimming well, having had my stroke rate finally plateau at it’s normal rate of 60, and the pilot also thought this and let me swim right through to the fourth hour. At this stage, they shifted me to half hour feeds, but I don’t recall much of what happened during this time.

At about 6am the sun started to come up and this was quite an exciting time for me. I remember looking around to see where the sun was going to come up. In my head, this was the hardest part completed. Swimming for quite a while in the scary night and it was probably going to be the coldest I got too.

Sun up: Instantly Warm.

Change in temperature: Negligible. Love the mind games…

And those were starting to play. I must have completely lost count of feeds, because I recall thinking at one stage, I’m pretty close to the other side. Then this enormous ship appeared.

<Oh no! This is the first shipping lane. I’m not even halfway.> This was the lowest I felt during the whole swim.  In fact, just quietly, I cracked it with myself.

“AM I SWIMMING THAT SLOW?!”, I howled.

“No mate, you’re swimming fine, just fine” - <Get on with it ya bloody windbag!>

<Grumble, grumble..>

I had made a pact with myself to keep feeds as quick as possible because of it’s effects extending your swim. Without knowing the specifics, I think I did pretty well. It was the other end where I was having problems. Since you are swimming and exercising for such a long period of time, you have to feed on a concentrated drink of carbohydrate. Now sooner or later your body says it’s had enough and you start to feel bloated (well I did anyway). Quite by mistake, I was given an Electrolyte drink at this time. It’s purpose is to flush your system so you can start with the Carbohydrate drinks again. Need I say it worked with a vengence?

It was also around this time that I started to get into French waters and if it hadn’t been glass flat before, it most certainly was now. What a pleasure to swim in! Warm and wonderfully clear. <To the lady at the back - No I didn’t see or smell any garbage at any time>. The second half of the swim, if I can describe it as that, just flew past. One difficulty I did have was staying close to the boat. As mentioned above, my right bias had become more pronounced as my stroke became more tired. I had decided to switch the side of the boat I swam beside, and in hind sight, I should have switched back earlier.

I’ve been told this is what proved to be the difference between landing at Cap Griz Nez and where I did eventually land. I believe I got within 300 metres of landing at this point at around the 10 hour mark, but due to the above and the tide changing this was not to be and I was swept up the coast. I didn’t actually realise I had got that close at the time - just keep swimming - and I’m not sure how I would have reacted if I had of and still missed it.

But I do know this. When Gowyn got in the water, it was either to lead me into shore or support swim with me. I couldn’t see any land, so it had to be the latter. No offense mate, but I once described him as a swimming washing machine. And here he was thrashing beside me?! <That bad huh? How embarrassing. We shall have to double our efforts!> In the spirit of friendship, I made sure he couldn’t keep up and they luckily dragged him out minutes later.

What made things even more confusing was it felt like we were turning around or heading parallel to the shore, which was what was happening, only problem was, I didn’t know why (at the time). Here I was trying to focus, when my head was also telling me that this wasn’t making any sense. Trust your pilot.

<Okay,  focus she knows what she’s doing, she’s got a better line of sight than you. Follow the boat Al, let it guide your actions..>

There comes a point, where if one misses the Cap that you swim into Wissant Bay. I had read from another very knowledgeable pilot, Mike Oram, that there is a place where the tide from Wissant Bay meets the tide travelling up Channel past Cap Gris Nez and they collide and create the ‘overfalls’. One body of water going out into the Channel and the other moving up it. This creates a body of choppy water and couple this with the final part of the swim makes this a tough place to be.

The Graveyard - Mike Oram.doc

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This part of the swim took incredibly long to complete. I remember having to almost reprimand myself from looking up. <You’re not allowed, you will hit land when you finish> It was also immensely disheartening watching the water particles race under you out to sea. <I’m not going anywhere… there’s definitely no way I’m swimming that fast…>. I can understand why it is called the graveyard. Expletives, the Greek God of Swearing, would have been proud and I’m not even sure a tub of Electrolyte would have remedied my bloated mouth!

I moved to the other side of the boat again. It was a case of putting your head down and doing it. It was now that I had to dig deep. I had no doubt I would make it. I was sure I would make it. I kept saying to myself ‘Keep your arms going…keep your arms going’. I could also see the Lads hanging over the side of the boat willing me on. Expletives bolted out of my mouth at the sight of them - I think they inquired how long the bay was.

It felt like I was getting battered, but this was probably because I could have ice skated across the previous 10 hours  had it been frozen. I can’t impress upon you how long it felt. Knowing you’re so close, but also knowing you’ve got to keep going for another couple of hours. And then I saw rocks below me.

Tired?! Woo! I’m sprinting baby! Fisher & Paykel, I’ll meet you in there!

…. Okay, I can barely stand - Don’t touch or help me or I’ll get disqualified… wait… wait for a good photo…rah rah rah..

Okay, now I’m good.

Has the hooter sounded to say I’m finished?

Better take one more photo.

This may sound crazy, but getting back into the water to swim back to the boat was bliss. It felt warm and comfortable. Of course, couldn’t let Gowyn beat me back either. Nice one mate, you’ve swum 14 & 1/2 hours and you’re racing an appliance back to the boat.

Getting up the ladder proved to be a bit of a mission, Jase and Ali pulling me up with Gowyn pushing me. Once on the boat, I just lay there in blankets and towels. More mentally exhausted than physically. It felt quite surreal. Basically dozed on the way back to the harbour and then it started to take it’s toll. The Lads organised and got me back to a hotel where they fortunately put me in a disabled room. The handles proved very helpful as I rescued myself after a long bath. Bedtime was about 7pm and I slept straight through… to the 7am morning breakfast call.

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FOOTNOTE:

After not having solids for over 21 hours, I happened to be fairly hungry the next day, not that I particularly felt it, but took a guess after I noted what I ate. This included a bowl of cereal, another of porridge, English breakfast, yoghurt, pack of biscuits, bunch of bananas, snickers and some lollies I found in the car - all before 10am.

Why did you bring your passport if you don’t get checked when you land in France? I had joked with my mates that I would be swimming to Oktoberfest, when my tide got pencilled in. This turned out to be almost exactly the truth. Twelve hours later I was there celebrating with my mates. What a weekend!!

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Minute Press Release

After about 14 & 1/2 hours I made it! A lot more to come. We’ll have the inside views, photos and reaction.

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So here it is. The challenge has been moved back and I’m due to start early Friday morning (12:00am UK time).

It’s a strange, yet wonderfully exciting time. Of late, the enormity of the task has hit me and of course this has lead to nerves, but I also have a very strong visualisation of landing in France and that makes me feel confident of making it. It’s also knowing how hard I’ve worked over the last 18 months culminating to this goal.

I’d also like to take the time to express my appreciation to those who have sent messages during the lead up, to those that have supported in more tangible ways, especially Dorothy Weatherley and my training partner Steve. Without you all, this journey would have been a lot tougher!

Back to the big day.

There will be a couple of mobile phones on board the pilot boat and I’d appreciate any support you can give. The preferential way of contact would be through the mapping program that Gowyn has designed. It can be watched at www.als-swimming.org/map. He’s also arranged for messages to appear on the map as we travel across. All you need to do is text the following:

gowyn.jones@gmail.com [then your message]

and send to this number +44 776 640 4142

Alternatively, if you don’t want your message to appear, it can be sent to:

Mine: +44 781 399 0374 (careful it’s not used to receiving texts)

Gowyn’s: +44 7913 661172

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Even without knowing the result, this has been an absolutely amazing journey! Notwithstanding the training, it’s the other aspects that have been a revelation, such as writing this blog (and thank you for your comments!), organising logistics for the numerous swims, organising donations, meeting and speaking to people about it and challenging myself by pushing through barriers I perceived as unbreakable. It is an experience that I would thoroughly recommend to anyone. A challenge, a big challenge and I think you’ll be surprised with what you can accomplish.

Sunday Night:

After arriving in Dover, the Sunday swim was postponed as the relay team swimming before me had taken about 23 hours to cross and the pilot couldn’t get back to port in time. I got the following text from pilot @ 17:47 -  Really sorry mate are not going 2 b back in time for start tonight…Also fair breeze over this side that’s why can’t get in…’

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At 2:47 am I received - ‘Weather turned crappy here for now mate…Don’t think we going anywhere 4 a bit. Sorry…’
I had been hoping for a Tuesday start, but with the weather closing in, we decided that it was probably best for me to return to Edinburgh, rather than waiting around and stressing. It looks like Friday may be on…

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Tuesday night:

Just checked forecast and it looks like the High pressure system (that brings settled weather) is going to move up the country, rather than get to the Channel. ARGH!!

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All these delays were not without their positives. It gave me time to release a leaflet that I had made up, so I could try and obtain donations…

The moment of truth arrived for Steve this week. He’d based himself down in Dover for the past couple of weeks and got the call that he’d start his swim on Monday morning at about 4am. I flew down to Gatwick, where he met me and his other boat supporter, Mike. I was meant to keep this quiet, but I’ll put it down to nerves. He lost his car in the car park for about an hour, but it was later found safe and sound - at the other terminal. Sorry mate. Aside from that he seemed very calm and we made our way back to Dover to catch a kip for the next couple of hours.

We metthe other support crew member, Rob, early that morning and got to ROCO in good time. Ali (the pilot) was her usual cheerful self and we also met Steve’s observer, Jenny, who was also very pleasant. We noted that most of the other boats were preparing to go to sea, so that was encouraging for all of us. We decided to get going first and headed to Shakespeare Beach (which was where we had started for the relay).

After we had greased Steve up and given him words of encouragement, he set off to the beach and was greeted by some onlookers (what they were doing awake and walking on the beach is anyone’s guess!) and I’m sure that gave him a boost. He got the hooter was soon in the water swimming past the boat. I recommended that he swim with long gliding strokes because the sea was a bit choppy and I was glad to see he followed this advice.

One of his aims was to improve his technique when he was down in Dover and I found this had been achieved significantly since I had last swum with him. Apart from the small hiccup when he feeding bottle landed on his head(!), he maintained his technique for the first 4 hours easily (at 64 strokes a minute), with his feeds also being completed quickly and efficiently. He started out feeding on every hour and then we increased it to every half hour.

One of the bonuses of starting early in the morning is getting the sunrise. It is one of the most uplifting feelings you can get, because even though the change in temperature is barely perceivable, the boast it gives you is immense. It also allows you to see the boats, rather than blocks of lights everywhere! And first on the menu was this beauty! The photo doesn’t do it justice, but it looked magnificent.

Both Rob and I had separate hour swims with Steve to keep him company and give a bit of reinforcement that we could go through what he was for a small amount of time. But boy, did it feel horrible getting back onto the boat. Having your body prone for even and hour and then rocking all over the place when on board. I’ll spare you the details, but the previous night’s dinner didn’t hang around long. Bedtime for me thanks.

<Steve probably carried on swimming>

I’m awake. Next up, was the middle of the channel. Steve continued to make good time and his feeds remained quick and accurate. It also produced, what I believe was, a hilarious example of European versus English weather. I love the contrast with dark enormous clouds and almost nothing. On the mid-point. I kid you not. Reminds me a lot of the English-Scottish border.

The tide that Steve was swimming on, happened to be one of the weakest of the year - meaning that he was not pushed too far up the Channel. It made an interesting comparison, looking where the various ferries passed us. You may remember (or even look to see) that the ferries passed us on starboard side of the vessel during the relay, yet here are seen on our port side. A Capt’n tis I! Arrrrl.

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When he got to the French side of the channel shipping lanes, the first signs of concern started to emerge on the boat. Steve’s stroke rate had slowed by 10 per minute and he was not consuming enough of his feeds. We tried to encourage him to have more, but he was drinking more seawater than the feeds. To combat this we tried to tell him to turn around and use his head to block the waves, but he wasn’t understanding.

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With the lack of fuel in his body and the deteriorating stroke rate, things were not looking good. The next thing that was going to set in was the cold and once it gets in you there’s not a lot you can do about it. We started mixing his feeds even stronger, to the extent that is was almost a gel. We also tried different flavours. When hypothermia is suspected, apart from counting the stroke rate, you can ask questions, firstly to see if you get a response and hopefully a coherant one at that. We asked him his dog’s name. “I have three!”. Alright matey. We decided to let him carry on.

We continued to monitor both his stroke rate, technique and general wellbeing throughout the next hour. We were also visited by the French coastguard and I’m pleased to say it wasn’t my fault this time! They were doing a recon trip to a cargo vessel close to us and decided to take our phot. I obliged and did the same.

There were now anxious times on the boat. Every time Steve stopped for a feed he was losing about 10 minutes of the swimming distance he had previously covered. In effect, going backwards. His stroke rate deteriorated further as did his technique. We opted to put ‘whinging’ Rob in to try and get him focussed and hopefully a bit more aware of what was going on.

You can see in the photo that Rob is doing breaststroke beside Steve, when they normally swim at about the same speed front crawl. When we tried to communicate with him, we were answered with a grunt, apart from when he was offered jellybabies, which was enthusically answered with ‘JELLYBABIES… JELLYBABIES!!’. With his strokerate now down to 42 strokes a minute, we took the decision to have Rob handle Steve and have the swim end.

It was a little soul destroying watching Steve react to this and then realising what was happening. Rob helped him over to the boat and then we somehow got him up onto the deck and lay him there after smothering him in blankets. I’m not sure if he remembers saying this, but he was definitely pretty happy to be out of the water. I later found out that he didn’t remember the last hour or so of the swim, so the helped us all justify the decision.

Interestingly enough, although the tide had been weak, the wind had blown us about 10km up the coast. All in all he spent about 14 hours in the water and fell less than 2 miles short of French soil. However, at the rate Steve was swimming it would have taken him an additional 4-5 hours to get there. He slept pretty much the whole way back to Dover, but talk about the powers of recovery, he was up again ready for some dinner and then up before me the next morning fresh like he’d not done anything! Amazing!

Although he didn’t quite make it, I’m extremely proud that he swam for as long as he did and that he’s already talking about coming back and having a crack at it next year.

And in other news… the weather forecast

“… again the nearer you get to France the lighter the wind for both days; and for the weekend into next week.

I’ve addressed this before, but the most common question I get asked is whether I use goose fat. Quite apart from having grown my own special brand, goose fat was used back in THE day - along with feeds of brandy and sausages! Nowadays, people tend to use Vaseline, however, due to the sensitive nature of my skin I’ve found that I’m unable to use it regularly. I’ve found that I can train for about 2 hours before I start to chaff. I can tell you it made for quite an exciting experience putting deodorant on the next morning after I found that out!

The other night, I decided to just swim lengths in ‘my pool’ until it went dark.  The water was wonderful as usual, but a bit on the cold side at the start if I’m honest (probably all the rain!). As I was swimming the last length, a pilot boat pulls up beside me…

“We’ve had a call from the coastguard. Are you alright?”
“Yep”
“What’s your plans and course?”
“Eh? <Gamma, Hotel, Bravo [Going Home Bro]> Just heading to the buoy and then swimming into shore”
I see the change on his face as he realises that I’m not wearing a wetsuit.
“How long have you been out here?”
“oh…a couple of hours…”

Good to know that they (and the residents of Granton) are keeping an eye on me.

As you know, I’ve been on standby for a while now and one of the problems has been the constant flow of weather fronts buffeting the UK. See this week:

It just seems that they are never ending, which of course they are, but you know what I mean! With time starting to run out, it’s starting to weigh on my mind - will I get to go this year or will it be another winter training? It probably will be anyway, because I’ve enjoyed it.

What a month…of frustration! Not that bad actually (I tend to dramatise!)  The remainder of this month saw a couple of defining events. The first was the purchase of my flat, apart from wondering where I found the time to do this, it also proved to be a master stroke. With the days slowly getting shorter, driving out to Steve’s (in Gullane) was not giving me the time I needed in the water to keep fit. It was a big call not going though - I tip my hat to Dorothy Weatherley for having me on the cusp of vegetarianism!

Back to the master stroke - I somehow managed to get a place right on the waterfront of Granton Harbour.  My own outdoor pool - okay sometimes have to share it with dogs! I’ve found that by swimming on the other side of the marina (wall in the middle of the picture) and out to the buoy (just above the boat on the left) and then swimming towards the buildings - there’s another large marker about halfway down - and back, takes me about 30 minutes. And get this, sometimes you get out and there’s an audience waiting for you to give you a round of applause! - Thank you, thank you very much (especially to Georgie and family for looking after my clothes - Oh, and that party flat across the road for the cheering the other night!)

I’ve haven’t come across many of my ‘other friends’, although got an absolute ripper of a sting on Friday. I didn’t see it, but BANG! boy did I feel it - scrapped across my forearm. Carried on swimming until my training quota (a further 3 laps) was complete, with my arm on fire for about the last 1/2 hour. When I got out, the only way to alleviate the pain was to keep my fist clenched. Why didn’t I get out straight away? Because it’s not going to be an option when I swim the channel.

Got back home and decided to leave it. I figured that the poison was in my system already and might as well see what the effects would be. About an hour later all this clear gel started coming out of my skin.  The skin on the rest of my arm was smooth, but where the sting had hit it was clammy. It lasted about 3 hours. The next day there wasn’t even a mark.

It’s been a bit of a revelation swimming out there by myself. It’s given me a ton of confidence, mainly because it’s challenged me to confront my fear of sharks front on. Swimming with someone sort of absolves me I feel. A weird sensation and not nearly as imposing as swimming by yourself. I am very aware that with this comes responsibility. I always make sure I’m close to the marina wall, or relatively close to shore (about 400 metres).  Mum - No lectures.

I’ve had a couple of times out there, where funny situations have occurred.  One, was when the tide was going out. I was able to motor down one leg of the lap (ended up a little bit further out than anticipated) and it took an age to swim back to the marker. Other times, I end up close into shore. It’s quite an experience feeling the strength of a tide carry you around. There’s also the ‘benefit’ of having the wind intensify and with that the waves strengthening during a swim. I’ve become somewhat accustomed to this now and it doesn’t really bother me.

One circumstance I wasn’t prepared for was sun glare. It was quite low in the sky and I thought I’d be able to get a couple more laps in. Got to the far end and it was ok, but coming back, everytime I looked up, I couldn’t distinguish a thing. Finally had to plot the course ‘watching’ the sun under the water. Ended a tad off course (but close to the marina) - was definitely in the Forth. Responsible.

With my preparation being complete so early, it makes for interesting times trying to maintain the fitness, not over doing it and remaining injury free. This was highlighted the other day when I was crossing the road and I demonstrated my terrestrial abilities by partially twisting my ankle. Fortunately this is not an uncommon occurrence for me, (can someone remind me my training wheels have been removed?) but I could just imagine all that training going to waste had it been more serious.

Although physically ready, the mental side is the toughest to keep in check. I’ve been feeling supremely confident about making this, in so far as, my visualisation consists of walking up on the beach. There tends to be focus on aspects of the swim, like the start, but it’s more about feelings and emotions rather than any physical demands. I’m not ignorant to dismiss that it’ll hurt. With the time waiting for the swim, your mind starts to play games with you, hesitations and worries start coming to the fore. Then there’s all the people asking when you’re going to swim, not to mention thinking about it yourself <I’ll talk more about this next time>.

To combat this, I took some time away to ‘freshen’ up, spent some time with mates and went body surfing. I spent some time down in Falmouth, Cornwall, where, yep, the water is like a bath. A terrific way to de-stress and come back ready to tackle it. It’s also been helped with the water being beautifully clear and flat when I got back too.

This month’s song has been Ave’ Maria by Pavorotti - I’ve no idea either, maybe because I was hungry.

With the credit crunch continuing to affect the world economy, the relative safe haven of Switzerland beckoned to soothe nerves and even provided the unexpected bonus of gold. That’s not really the case, as I had organised this trip back in April with the other mini challenges, but still a rather impressive opening sentence.

One of the aims of the challenges I set was to make them steadily more difficult, well on paper anyway. The Lake Zurich swim is a 26.4km (16.4 miles) marathon down the length of the lake, expertly organised by Sri Chinmoy every year. Upon arriving in Zurich, I met up with the Serpentine Swimming Club (a tiny nod to the legends!) who I found to be very accommodating and friendly. We had a couple of short races and I also decided to swim across a short bay and back to get used to the water temperature. I found it to be remarkably warm but also lacking buoyancy since it was fresh water.

Swimmer’s note: Make sure to keep body flat otherwise legs will drop creating more drag. A small beat kick will combat this.

Loaded up on a massive lasagne that night for dinner and then had a huge breakfast the next morning. At about 6am I met my pilots for the first time and loaded the boat, whilst giving them instructions for the feeds and the course I wanted to take. The plan was to feed every hour for the first 3 and then every half an hour until finish.

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The race started at 7am and although I had prepped myself not to go out fast, found the competitive nature in me too hard to quell and was in the leading bunch within a few minutes. We had been briefed to swim towards the headland, which was about 6km away. I was about two thirds of the way there, when the first feed was due. I was still quite full from breakfast (remember kids don’t swim with a full stomach!), so asked them to delay it until I got to the headland. Reached that at an hour and a half, but still didn’t think I required it, so carried on until two hours and then had one.

If I’m completely honest, I had also been thinking about the amount of feeds I had budgeted for and the length of the swim. The swim was estimated to take about 7 hours, so with 3 litres of feed (where I consumed half a litre each time) this was not going to be enough. With times as tough as these, I had to tighten my belt, and hope my power bill would reduce as well.

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My next two stops were after an hour and then I reduced the time for the next two to 45 minutes. Can’t describe what happened during this time very well. I must have sung a 20-second segment of Autumn Almanac by The Kinks about a billion times though. OH! and trying to make it to this white church on one of the headlands. Since it was quite large it felt like it wasn’t getting any closer, because you’re effectively at ground level and you interpret it to being the same size - especially if you keep looking at it.

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The halfway stage was defined by a ferry crossing. There were support boats there to co-ordinate the safe passage through this. When I got there, the ferry was loading vehicles so was asked to swim around the front of it. The Captain obviously wasn’t too keen on this, as I soon found out when the engines roared into life and the water around me turned into an enormous jacuzzi. THAT was cool!

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As I was spat out the other side, I emerged amongst a family of ducks swimming past. They didn’t see the funny side and promptly left the scene.

When you’re swimming for this length of time, your brain just goes into autopilot. Mine had a bias to the right I found out when I ‘came to’ swimming amongst a load of reeds. No bother though, at least I had missed someone’s home built wharf a couple of metres earlier.

I knew I was close to the lead and one of the benefits of not feeding is not stopping, because when you do, you inevitably want to chat as demonstrated here. I’m not too bad at keeping the feedings [sic] quick, and tend to carry on swimming on my back anyway. Here I’m asking where the other swimmers are.

When I got around the final corner I could see the finish at the other end of the lake. Quite by chance there was a relay team ‘flying’ past, so I decided to race them. I was offered a feed part way through, but I declined, as I tried to keep up. An hour and quarter later and we were still miles away from the finish and I was starting to cramp [ok, I’ll let you win this round humans]. Had the feed and then we saw the finish line literally 400 metres away. Cruised in there all proud of myself. Sorry it’s for another race – yours is down that way (approximately a million miles [about 4km]).

Having to motivate yourself to start swimming again is hard. I ended up swimming down the coast and then across to the finish line. The last 500 metres was the killer. Expletives were the main course, with tantrums for dessert. Brain was laughing in the background – SHUT UP BRAIN!!

When I FINALLY got to the landing, I was immediately interviewed for TV. I can now relate to how athletes feel after a race.

“How was the swim?” <think of something funny>
“A bit short” <I thought as I started to cramp in my hamstrings as I bent down to answer her>
“Is the scenery as beautiful as New Zealand’s?”
“It’s right up there, and your water is exceptionally warm. Maybe you could look to have it chilled next time”.
<Laughs> <I wasn’t joking then :o(  >

With most of the other swimmers swimming in wetsuits, I think they thought I was joking about the temperature! I was third to finish (first in the men’s division without wetsuit) in just under 7 & ½ hours and even with the issues I experienced with the very last bit, I still think I could have made the return journey.

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As a part of the swim, I had also volunteered in a physiological study to assess the impact of extended physical activity on the body. Personally I was found to be in pretty good shape with not many changes at all, however, I had somehow gained more fat on some parts of my body. Get that man on a TV talkshow!

One of the things that impressed me was how they treated you afterwards. I was given a full body massage (Brrr! – STOP IT!), and a huge selection of food – I was still trying to finish digesting the lasagne. The prizegiving was also a very pleasant consideration. I received a trophy, medal and framed certificate in front of everyone as well as some rather random parcels of food.

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After having a few ‘waters’ that night to celebrate and getting up early the next morning to catch a flight I felt in very good shape. Here’s hoping the same will be able to be said after the BIG one!

I’ve had some interesting comments of late, but one that really struck a chord was that this site had been featured on Google news! How’s that?! The biggest search engine on the web and they highlight me. Well I think so… I tried to find it so I could show you guys but couldn’t, so if someone does, let me know.

Anyway, it got me thinking, how many hits does this site get? The answer that came back well and truly blew me away.

It gets over 2000 hits a week! AND I can only ‘discount’ about 10 for my own maintenance. It would have been interesting to see how it increased from the start. Anyway, enough of the periphery issues…

Although I’m booked to swim in late September, I have been hoping to get this moved forward. I got another opportunity this week to swim on Wednesday 30th July at 2am. (I write this Tuesday night) . The weather is going to be perfect, but it was one of the awful situations where I had to turn it down because I couldn’t get in touch with my support crew. ARGH! I think it is important to have them there, in particular Steve as I train with him and he probably knows my swimming the best. 

‘Luckily’ the rest of the week looks like it’s going to be weather affected so  I’ll be jetting off to Switzerland for my next mini challenge.