Race Report

We were booked as 2nd position on the tide between 13th - 18th August 2009. The weather in the couple of weeks leading up to the start of the tide has been extremely good with quite a few swimmers bringing their attempts forward to make the most of the opportunity. Given that the weather had been very unpredictable up until that point when I received a call to ask if we would consider swimming early I quickly contacted everyone to see who was free and when. The first date that everyone could do was Tuesday 11th. As a result we went onto standby for that date.

Even as late as Monday afternoon we were still assuming that we would swim. During the late afternoon when the pilots were returning from the previous swims the wind picked up and Suva struggled back in Force 7 conditions.

When you looked at the harbour or even at the water from above Shakespear beach all looked calm - it just shows why the pilots are worth their weight in gold - they know what's going on in the channel and when and how the conditions may change during the swim.

As a result of the forecast we were stood down for the swim, and put on standby for lunchtime Tuesday instead.

Tuesday lunchtime arrived and the weather was still not good enough, so we were put on standby for Wednesday morning!!

Tuesday evening arrived and the conditions were still uncertain, but Alison & I agreed to 'have a look'. What we mean by this is that we'd all arrive in Dover, load the boats and travel round to the start and take a look at the conditions and make a decision as to whether to swim or not. I texted round everyone and and gave them the news and we seemed all set. About 2 hours later I received a call from Neil who was not convinced about the conditions, the wind had picked up again and was concerned that the conditions of Monday would return during the swim. Neil has the knack of being extremely accurate with forecasts so when he advised against the swim I was very happy to accept the advice.

Our next possible slot is now Friday. The reason for this is that now we are swimming within the tide dates we move back to our 2nd position. So we wait and see..........

Friday is go!!!!

We all gathered in the car park at Dover Marina at just after 2am before making our way to the boats. We packed all our stuff on board, took a few nervous photos and before we knew it we were heading out in the dark towards Shakespear beach for the start.

Once we arrived the first swimmers Lesley (SEALAGS) and Josh (J-CLOTHS) jumped into the water and swam to shore. They waited for the horn to signal the start, and at 0336 they ran into the water and the race was on.

J-CLOTHS were faster on paper and Josh went off like a rocket on steroids!! From that point onwards SEALAGS never caught up. Only the first 2 swimmers in each team had to swim in the dark, by the end of the 2nd swim it was starting to get light and sunrise was at 0540. For the rest of the day it would be light. The conditions varied from overcast to lovely and sunny and the water from calm to a force 5 for a few hours.

The swim order was as follows:

J-CLOTHS - Josh Williamson; Sharlene Sebo; Peter Jackson; Tracy Pearson; Jo Tierney; Jonathan Monk
SEALAGS - Lesley Zimmerman; Alison Bateman; Emma France; Sissy Gasson; Ali Yarmohammad; Gary Fagg

We had supporters on both boats with Josh France supporting the J-CLOTHS and Sam Fagg & Sam Tierney supporting SEALAGS.

Seasickness was a HUGE issue for SEALAGS with all but Emma, Gary and Sam Tierney being ill at some point. I really felt for Lesley, Ali and Sam F who were ill for pretty much the whole journey.

J-CLOTHS won the race in an unofficial time of 13 hours 48 mins, SEALAGS finished in 14 hours 28 mins.

So those are the facts. To find out what it was REALLY like from the swimmers themselves, follow the links on the left to the race reports for each team. The image below shows our route - J Cloths are red and SEALAGS are yellow.