The £250k swim

The Quarter of a Million Pound Swim

The weather didn’t improve but the 12 swimmers taking part in this year’s Light Fund fundraiser went ahead anyway – raising a record level of donations in the process.

It was, however, a much tougher challenge than anyone could have imagined.

We present the inside story of the 2022 Light Fund English Channel Relay

Swim...

It wasn’t the ideal start for the two teams taking part in this year’s Light Fund English Channel Relay Swim fundraiser… ‘NEWSFLASH: Swim postponed to 12:00am (00:00) on Wednesday 29th June 2022 due to bad weather off the French coast.’ A challenging, and possibly dangerous relay race involving two teams of six people swimming from Dover to France, each of them due to be in the water on at least two and sometimes three separate occasions, was now on hold. After months of swim training, fitness training, cold water training, medical assessments and bouts of covid, all of which they had to fit around regular work, child care, family demands and dwindling social life, twelve members of the licensing industry were forced to cool their heels by the sea. But not for long. Next day they were off, led by Stephen Gould and Ian Down, the respective team captains, striking out in the pitch black of night 40 minutes ahead of schedule at 11.19 pm on 29 June in what were still difficult weather conditions. The teams were, however, assured by the experienced and trustworthy pilots of their two tiny support boats – High Hopes and Optimist – that the weather would improve. It didn’t. As Gould says: “At the fifth swimmer changeover after four hours of swimming, the official acknowledgment on board was that we would not have left port had these weather conditions been predicted. We were swimming in a Force 5.” Please do not try this at home… There were other problems. At 3.07 am, Terry Lamb texted the small group of late-night Light Fund Challenge supporters following the race on a specially organised WhatsApp stream with the following words: “Seasickness. Cold. Dark. Tired. And now the jellyfish are about! And making their presence known.” Of all these issues the seasickness – both on and off the boats – was the toughest. Most of the swimmers were very seasick from an early stage. And most were still recovering when their second swim (and, in the case of half the swimmers, third swim) came up. But they knew that once they were in the water they had to keep going. The rules, laid out by the Channel Swimming & Piloting Federation (CS&PF), the governing body for English Channel swimming, are strict about people not helping you. If someone puts a hand out and helps you back onto the boat your whole team is disqualified. At 4.06 am the late-night WhatsApp followers saw this message: “We’ve entered the world’s busiest shipping lane: 600 tankers and 400 ferries pass through here every single day. It’s beginning to get very busy.” But at least it wasn’t dark anymore. By then the sun was rising. The second stint for the teams began shortly after 5 am. But the seasickness didn’t stop, and a third swim was still some way off. Within the next two hours, however, the messages of support started to

multiply as normal people got out of bed and marvelled at the short film clips and photos the swim squad had compiled of apparently tiny swimmers in a vast expanse of water. Some also followed a link to the boat tracker set up by CS&PF to see who was winning. This was, after all, a relay race. By 8.00 am messages of support were coming in on WhatsApp at a rate of four or five a minute – over 300 had arrived by 9.00 am. Many were accompanied by donations that would go to a range of beneficiaries, including, appropriately enough, the RNLI. Meanwhile the seas were getting choppier, the ships appeared to be getting bigger and, of course, most of the swimmers were feeling unwell and had barely slept at all. By 10.30 am France was in sight – not close but definitely visible. The messages of support poured in, and the chorus of encouragement got almost hysterical as land approached – which it did, just under four hours later. By this time, so many licensing industry employees were following the race that not much work was getting done. Not that their bosses minded; in fact in one or two cases the boss was actually in the water. At 2.26 pm UK time the long-awaited message came through: Rhys Fleming was the first swimmer to touch French soil. The High Hopes team did it in 14 hours and 56 minutes! WhatsApp went mad. Jason Goonery made it to land for the Optimist team not long after – in 15 hours and 24 minutes. The flood of congratulations continued. Many people following the race on WhatsApp were marvelling at an extraordinary feat, but few were aware that it was even more impressive than they thought. Only two swimmers of the 12 had ever done anything like this before. And only four others were of an open water swimming standard that would be deemed capable of attempting an English Channel relay – even in decent conditions. In fact as Kevin Langstaff said: “I trained in water down to 3.0C, swam multiple 5K events and covered over 275 km of training within only 18 months to prepare. Two years ago I couldn’t swim front crawl.” There had been dangerous and demanding Light Fund challenges before of course but as Gould puts it, “this time there was no hiding place. We each saw and heard what no colleague should ever have to witness or endure. The show only went on if each swimmer also did their timely turn regardless of their disposition. Not to do so meant instant disqualification.” Let’s not forget either that everyone who wasn’t suffering in the water was sharing a miserably small deck area on two tiny support boats for two thirds of an entire day. No wandering down to spacious bunks or dining in the mess for this lot. They also pushed the fundraising over the £250,000 target in time for The Licensing Awards where the challenge’s many sponsors and donors received a formal – and fulsome – thank you at one of the biggest annual gatherings of the licensing community. All sponsors who supported the swim were namechecked in a special challenge event film presentation. Looking back, the team response, even weeks later, was still of relief – and slight horror. As Gould, a very experienced cold and open water swimmer, explains: “Two relay swim teams racing each other across the English Challenge was never going to be straightforward or without drama. However, none of us could have predicted the raw ugliness of what we actually got and yet managed to achieve. It was not text book, it was not pretty, and it was undoubtedly a challenge above and beyond even our worst expectation.” Katie Price agrees. “Swimming the Channel with the conditions that we had was brutal. It was unforgettable for so many reasons, good and bad! However, I feel incredibly proud to be able to call myself a Channel swimmer.” But this challenge undoubtedly caught the imagination of an entire industry, and perhaps that, above all, made it worthwhile. As the teams put it: “To all of those who supported us we thank you most sincerely. Without you, this would have been a barren and no doubt futile endeavour. Your endorsement of us – and belief in us – through kind and generous sponsorship helped us dig deep and find reserves when the light of hope was fading.” But perhaps the incident that brought home the scale of the challenge was a touch more prosaic. Two magnums of chilled Champagne were taken to France to celebrate the channel crossing. One was returned unopened.

This may be the first and last time that anyone from the licensing industry turns down a drink!

“Swimming the Channel with the conditions that we had was brutal. It was unforgettable for so many reasons, good and bad! However, I feel incredibly proud to be able to call myself a Channel swimmer.”

So many licensing industry people were following minute-byminute the race that not much work was getting done!

Seasickness - in and out of the water, jellyfish, waves the size of houses, and swimming in the world’s busiest shipping lane were just some of the challenges. No wonder more people have climbed Everest than completed the English Channel Swim.

The event’s Just Giving page is still open. If you want to show your appreciation of this astonishing feat (or donate even more than you have already), just follow the link: https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/thelightfundenglishchannelrelayswim2022