July 2010 Newsletter
Recent Open Water events have been enjoyed by five members of the Marlins Swim Club, who are based at the Heights Leisure Centre, Sandown.
At Stanswood Rescue Centre, Calshot, the Solent Swimming Club ran their annual event last weekend.
Lindsey Shenton, Duncan Heenan, Jane Dodd, Rebecca Wills and Jenny Ball swam the traditional course along the beach and back, a total of 2 Kilometres.
Half of the course was against a strong tide making finishing times a little slower than usual but nevertheless, everyone finished strongly and had thoroughly enjoyed the swim.
Times were ; Lindsey 42 minutes, Jane 58 minutes, Rebecca, Duncan and Jenny taking a little over an hour.
Two weeks previously, in glorious sunshine, Lindsey, Jane, Rosemary Johnson and Jenny, travelled to Knoll Beach at Studland Bay for the East Dorset Open Water Swimming Club’s inaugural Seahorse Swim.
There the Race Officer was Bob Cooper, who had been invited to advise the club on procedures for the swim, based on his experience of being Isle of Wight Marlins’ race officer for their annual Sandown to Shanklin Sea Swim, which takes place in conjunction with Shanklin Regatta.
A longer course of 3.8 kilometres was quite challenging for the 100 participants including four members of Isle of Wight Marlins.
Lindsey Shenton, who just missed out on the awards, swam in one hour 20 minutes, Jane Dodd one hour 40 minutes, Jenny Ball and Rosemary Johnson in just over one hour 42 minutes. Jenny was presented with a handsome box of toiletries for being the oldest female participant!
Back in a cold, wet Suffolk in June, Rebecca, Jane and Jenny swam the first of the British Gas Great One Mile swims at Alton Water, a reservoir near Ipswich.
These swims , which promote Open Water swimming to the public, are in their third year, each seeing a huge increase in the numbers taking part.
Waves of 200 swimmers take to the water every 30 minutes, on this occasion to be greeted with a blustery outburst of rain! Times are not as important as taking part in such a huge event with stalls of every kind, charity fundraising and tremendous camaraderie.
The other three swims are in London, Strathclyde and Windermere, all one mile and will be shown on TV in the autumn.
