Finished!

Well folks, it was emotional but we did it. In a little over 2 hours we came in to the beach at Southsea, a little sore, a little tired and more than a little worried about what kinds of gastro-intestinal diseases we had contracted from swallowing too much Solent water. So if you want to know how it went take a look at the below:



So just a quick role call of honour and thanks:

Mark & Will - our 2 safety boat drivers who did a wonderful job of making the whole thing feasible - especially Mark who stepped in at the last minute unbelievably generously and salvaged our chances of success. A materclass in Safety for anybody who happened to be in the Solent that day...

Anna, Ness, Kathy, Mrs. P, Christopher, Ricos, Emma & countless others - our support crew, welcoming committee and providers of the finest bacon & egg sandwiches washed down by Champagne that i have ever had the pleasure of eating

And to the countless others who helped volunteer route information (albeit my aunts & uncles telling me it would take 4 hours rather than 2 on the Friday night wasn't that much appreciate :), safety boat driving and loan and just general support for the effort

And finally to everyone who has givn so generously to our venture. We are at a fantastic £5.5k and are incredibly grateful to everyone - massive thanks.

I promise that will be it on stupid challenges from me for the moment. Got to concentrate on being a dad which i think will be enough of a challenge for the forseeable future...

Congratulations from a suitably proud wifelet

So, cut to Sat 13 June, 8.50am, and to 2 svelt wet suit clad, slightly nervous figures doing their final stretches on Ryde sand whilst Mrs G does her best to say how close the other side looks (!?) and how great the conditions are. One of these 2 is a lie...
5 minutes later, the boys were off, and Mrs G was left to nervously watch from the shore as they and the two support RIBs (thank you so much Will, Ness, Anna, Mark and Mrs P) headed off to sunny Southsea...
Two hours, one hovercraft speedy zip for Mrs G, about 20,000 strokes from the swimmers, a fair dose of cramp and a welcome lack of cargo ships later, we were on the other side, cheering the boys home.
What an effort.
Si, Dom - I am totally impressed and so proud of you - it was a long long way to go.
Shame the post-swim beer guzzling was less impressive. Next time, more drinking, less snoozing.
Great work. What a morning. Please don't do it again.

Solent "dry" run

So - 13 days to go till the 13th. Too many 13s for my liking. Si and I had our first actual training swim in the Solent today, accompanied by Si's brother in law, Ed, in his RIB. Discovered some good and some bad things.

The bad - it's busy out there, luckily it's pretty easy to spot a couple of swimmers all in black, in a big sea, from a super tanker; current's quite strong and you don't make much progress when you have to swim against it; with an easterly wind, the sea was pretty big and that makes it slightly tougher than the local pool; wetsuit chafing - may have to use some vaseline next time, pretty sure I've got some.

The good - warmer than expected. Amazing what a difference 2 degrees makes; we both left the water feeling we could rise to the challenge on the day, and we both look great in rubber, as you can see; no sharks, this time, but quite a lot of seaweed.

Tomorrow the plan is to swim round the Old Fort which I guess is about 2k, which should be a good run. I gather Si's cousin did it when she was 8, which is somewhat emasculating. Let's hope we make it.

Training update

Well with only a couple of weeks left, thought I would let you know how training is going...and somewhat surprisingly - pretty well!

Always a sucker for a bit of technical kit, I splashed out (clever - see what i've done there?) a quite frankly ludicous amount of money on a swimming wetsuit and whist it has severe competition, it could possibly be the greatest technical fibre I have bought to date.

Road tested in the Isle of Wight over Easter (the coldest time of the year for the Solent and my god was it cold) it did me proud. Unfortunately the lack of any headware prevented me from sticking my head in the water for more than about 10 strokes so it was a pretty short roadtest mostly involving breaststroke...

However, only a couple of weeks later and we were back in action in Galicia, Spain. 15 degrees water temp held no barriers as it sorted me out no end for a few training swims. The only issue that I did have was a slightly dsconcerting realisation that I don't actully like swimming in the open sea... Something about an over-active imagination and too many Jaws films as a child make me fear the sea-beasties that don't exist and make me convinced that I am about to be shark bait. Usually this is a temporary feeling so hopefully (fingers crossed) I should be ok...bit of a bugger if not...oh well, here's hoping...

Dom & I also have started training in a gravel pit outside Heathrow (glamorous I know). Quite scary - lots of fairly grown up Triathletes looking very serious. What with my general co-ordination and Dom's immense physicaly presnce we look right at home...

We have also done some last minute logistics (re)organisation so we are nearly there - another post to follow shortly with our final plans

If you've got any advice for me about how to overcome my Jaws fears then I am all ears - just click on the link below to give me your toptips...

What's it all about?

Swimming basically. Quite a long way. Across the whole Solent.

And ok, lets be honest, it isn't like it is as big as the channel or the ocean, but we reckon it is far enough. About 5km's in total. And given the added challenges of very strong tides and sodding great big boats that we need to avoid, it should be a fair old bit of a challenge.

The plan is to swim early morning one weekend in the summer. At the moment we have got a couple of different weekend's penned in for June but we won't know exactly which until nearer the time as we need good conditions - swimming in a force 9 hoolie won't be that much fun...

And its not all shit and giggles (because it sounds so much fun already right?) - we are doing it for a good cause - Cystic Fibrosis Trust

Click here and you can go to our justgiving page - sure you've done it before - all easy, secure and if that's not enough incentive, the kind Mr Darling will give CFT all of your donation without skimming off any tax - well it just doesn't get better than that now does it?

how hard can it be???

So looking out of my office window today i'm thinking, how hard can it be to swim a few Kms in the sunshine? Sound more like a holiday boys, but hey, you're still my watery heroes. Good luck with the training...

Cystic Fibrosis Trust - Our Very Great Cause

So why are we doing this? Pretty simple really - to raise bucket loads of cash for a fantastic cause - the Cystic Fibrosis Trust.

Cystic Fibrosis is the UK’s most common life-threatening inherited disease. It affects over 8,000 people in the UK, with over two million people in the UK carrying the faulty gene that causes Cystic Fibrosis – around 1 in 25 of the population.

Cystic Fibrosis affects the internal organs, especially the lungs and digestive system, by clogging them with sticky mucus. This makes it hard to breathe and digest food. Each week, five babies are born with Cystic Fibrosis and each week three young lives are lost to CF.

http://www.cftrust.org.uk/

So yes, we know there is a credit crunch, a recession and the endless banging on of Robert Peston to content with, but if you could fnd even a few of your hard earned sheckles to donte to this exceptionally good cause, we would be extremely grateful

And in 2 months time, as we are knackered, freezing cold and about to be run down by a super-tanker, it would be great to know that it is all worth it for the huge amount of money we have raised