Yes, How did you find yourself spending your weekend? At the pub, at the park enjoying the glorious weather currently experienced in the United Kingdom, watching a series on TV, getting 700 plus signatures on a petition to help combat climate change, have a nice long lie in on the sunday followed by brunch with the family. The more mundane might have washed the car, seen a movie. Some in my industry were pounding the hallways at a global industry expo in Amsterdam. For others in the sport of Open water swimming they might have found themselves doing a loop around Brownsea Island in Poole harbour, Others took to the river Dart for an annual 10km swim. A marathon length swim – which in itself is no easy task.The list is endless, but for the majority, it was business as usual. You can get quite a bit achieved in 48 hours or more.
Now, for three people around the world, business as usual is just not somthing they want to do, The chores on the homefront really do not float their boat so how do these three People wile away their weekends? The clue is they all like a bit of swimming, but not just your average swim. something a bit out of the ordinary, maybe something that has not been done before. They find themselves at a loose end on some wonderful sunny weekend in Europe and They all have a small goal in mind.
Enter Sarah Thomas, Cameron Bellamy and Lars Simonsen. Well, if you are not one of them and are not part of the aforementioned group in the paragraphs above, then you are one of the thousands of people around the globe glued to a computer screen watching a little dot drift slowly across a screen, updating itself every 10 minutes or so.
So who are these three?
At about 6am this morning, after aproximatly 54.5 hours of swimming, Sarah Thomas swam herself into the record books again. After starting her swim at 12.07am on Sunday morning. Becoming the first person ever to swim from England To France across the channel 4 Times. She had waited a long time for this after being diagnosed with Cancer 2 years ago she went on to swim many long swims in her home country of the USA. Clocking up other phenomenal swims in the process; but the channel was the one she wanted and now she has it. The world record for the most crossings of the channel in a single swim.
This was not her first time in the channel but it was her first 2 way crossing, her first 3 way crossing and the first ever 4 way crossing of the stretch of water. She was ably assited by her crew and piloted but Eddie spelling, channel pilot on Anastasia and his crew.
About a day earlier, another Record fell to the hands of Cameron Bellamy. A 37 year old south African Endurance swimmer. He had also found himself at a loose end over the weekend with nothing to do. This was mainly due to the fact that his plans to swim from Cuba to Florida Keys had been thwarted by the American authorities’ refusal to allow his boat to make the crossing,
So with all that training done and not much to do on the weekend, At 8.20 am Saturday morning he struck out from St Peters bay in Barbados for the 151.7 km (94 miles) crossing to St Lucia Isalnd. This was when trackerholics around the globe started to get glued to their computer screens for another record in th making. Then at 12.07am on sunday they had two record swims to track. Like Sara , Cameron is a seasoned endurance athlete haveing completed the Ennglish channel, completed the oceans seven swims and also rowed across the indian Ocean amoungst other phenominal swims
After 56 hours and 36 minutes Cameron swam himself into history and the record books by completeing the Longest Ocean swim. Beating the 124.4 km swim set by Chloe McCardel from Eleuthera Island to Nassau in the Bahamas
So two days pass and two amazing records fall. For the next, this was not a single non stop swim. At 1370km (852 miles) I am not surprised. On Sunday September 15th Lars Simonsen finished his swim Around Denmark to become the first person to do it. Lars describes himself as a full time Adventurer, always waiting for something to happen.
Lars is not an endurance swimmer per se but classes himself as an adventure athlete who loves taking on all things that will put him out of his comfort zone and challenge hsi abilities. This last swim was sposred by Swim Denmark. It seems that Lars is not alone in his adventurous streak as he coerced his mother to come and kayak for him around Denmark.
As you can see, it has been a very busy weekend for the marathon swimming world and with 3 records falling in the space of 2 days. Phenomenal swimming by all of the above. Whilst most can only dream of doing a standard marathon swims, these three are really pushing the limits of human endurance and breaking down all concievable barriers in the sport.
CONGRATULATIONS SARA, CAMERON AND LARS.
For me, it makes my puny attempts at swimming seem positively insignificant but I will keep doing what I can and dream of one day doing something even close to these icons of swimming.