I’ve asked a few swimmers to share their views of how training with the DCT group was for them. This is the first in that series by Paul Harris, 2019 soloist.

The story below is how I got to Dover,

I completed a 6-person 2-way relay in 2013, I hated every minute of it, my 1st swim was in the pitch black and started in the shipping lanes, all I could see around me was lights in the distance, the water felt as if I was swimming in the Antarctic, I was struggling to catch my breath & I was petrified of Jellyfish (After watching Seven Pounds with Will Smith played on my mind) anyway, I felt disappointed with the successful swim and wanted to attempt it again & really appreciate how special swimming the English Channel is, the swim was an unsuccessful crossing due to a swimmer having a meltdown and taking longer than the allocated time it takes to get in the water, (although at the time we were not aware & only found out when our swim disappeared from the CSPF Twitter feed).

I had wanted to attempt a solo effort but always had the fear of not completing it hanging over me, I guess that was from a solo Windermere in 2014, although Windermere was successful it really gave me a kick up the backside I needed, I had done very little with cold water swimming (No more than 3 hours previously), I travelled up with my 2 friends from Hastings to Windermere on the Friday and attempted the swim on the Saturday, my feeds were all cold tap water I only had gels I had no idea how and when to feed & I felt so cold, after the swim I honestly thought their was no chance I would be able do a solo.

I then signed up for another 3 person relay in 2017 which was successful, but again I struggled with the cold slightly, what made it harder was I was on holiday with my family in Spain a week before & they had a heat wave, I then did another 3-person 1-way in August 2018 which was successful, for 4 weeks after my swim I kept saying to my wife I fancied a solo attempt, she said you have spoken about this since 2013 when you learned to swim, if you don't do it now then you never will, so you either need to get signed up or forget about it!!

So with this being put bluntly by my wife I decided to get signed up for a solo attempt, all of my swims had been done by the CSPF Mike & Lance Oram and always in August, so with this in mind my date was the 8th -14th August 2019.

And so to Dover,

For me to stand a chance of being successful I had to go down to Dover to be part of the Channel Swimming Group, I live about 10 mins drive from the sea in Hastings but I knew I needed to be a part of a group of people who were doing the same thing, I knew that if I was going to do it by myself I would not be successful as it is to easy to talk yourself out of doing longer swims, plus having someone tell you "this is what your doing today" completely takes away all responsibility of trying to do your own training plan, it also helps to have someone who has been there, done it and got the T-shirt to guide you.

I missed the 1st weekend of the Dover Channel group training as I was away, I did however start the following weekend, my 1st swim was an induction swim consisting of about 15 mins swimming in an anticlockwise position past the sailing club to the green buoy which reminded me of an apple & then back in again, after a short period of time I then got back in the water and swam again for 45 minutes. Sunday was an hours swim followed by an hour out and another swim consisting of an hour & 15 mins.

After getting home I knew that joining up with the Dover Channel Swimming training group was going to be the reason I was going to be a successful solo channel swimmer!!

The whole group of swimmers on the beach are amazing people, they come in all different shapes and sizes, & from all different backgrounds but everyone is treated as an equal, there is so much experience and knowledge from people who have done so many amazing things in their lives, it is inspiring hearing why people are taking on the challenge, many do it to raise money for worthwhile causes & to carry on the memory of an ill or loved one.

When all the swimmers start you go off at the same time as the time goes on you start to swim with people who are at a similar pace to you, this helps to take away the negative thoughts that can come in to your head from time to time, what then happens is you find that all of a sudden you are expanding your circle of friends, I took part in some swimming events and met people at the events who were also attending the weekend swims in Dover.

I got to be part of another solo swim (Steve Henigan) to help out as crew, this was really helpful to look at how Steve organised his swimming rota consisting of feeds, how often, what he used to help how long he took when having each feed, Steve got a lot of his information from other swimmers who had gone before him (You would not get this experience/information if you were trying to do it on your own).

Another valuable point was when I was suffering with the cold & had the negative thoughts of can I do this, why cant I get warm, was reassuring to see that everyone else was also having the same experiences when we came in for our feeds, again had I not of been part of the channel training community I believe that if I was trying to do this on my own I would have talked myself out of the water & not done the specific swims I would have needed to do.

If you want to have a successful Swim then personally you need to commit to making every training session you can and get to Dover every weekend or as many as possible, when my swim came along I was apprehensive about what I was about to do (Out of respect for the channel) but more excited as I knew that I had done everything which Emma told me to do, I knew that I had prepared well I had got some much information from others who had swam previously.

My advice is get yourself a good structured training plan pre-season then once May comes around just do everything which Emma and her team tells you to, the only thing I did not do a lot of in my training was strength work (Bodyweight) this would be something which I would encourage people to include in their plan.

If you are attempting your swim this year, stay positive, stay focused & keep in touch with your Dover Channel Swimming group, best of luck!

Kind regards,

Paul Harris

Guest Blog: Paul Harris