26/08/2026
A tale of 24 hours, 5 swims & a lot of laps 🏊♀️
After a night in the campervan in a riverside pub car park, we headed over to Watersedge 24hr Relay swim early to find the rest of the gang. Six of us in the team, and it was lovely to see everyone in such good spirits. There was a brilliant festival atmosphere, and with warm sunshine all weekend, it made the whole thing extra enjoyable… especially for those in tents!
I’d picked up a cold a couple of days beforehand, so I was feeling pretty ropy and, to be honest, probably shouldn’t have been there, let alone swimming! But it was for charity, I’d been sponsored, and I couldn’t let my teammates down. I’m not sure they’d have been too impressed if they’d had to cover my late-night and early-morning shifts! 😂
The relay started at midday and I was 5th on the rota, with my first swim at 4pm. Not knowing how warm the water was going to feel, I opted for a long-sleeved neoprene costume as a compromise. I pottered around doing a mixture of breaststroke and front crawl. Without a watch, it was hard to judge how long I’d been swimming, but after 6 laps (400m each, I was told) I was getting cold and was really hoping I’d be directed towards the exit as I approached the last buoy…
Nope. Around I went again. Drat. 😂
My second shift was at 10pm. Not too uncivilised, but pitch black. Time to break out the wetsuit.
In my snotty haze I’d completely failed to think about packing clear goggles for night swimming 🤦♀️, so front crawl became rather challenging. Add in a cold and some rather enthusiastic indigestion, which made breaststroke very uncomfortable, and I ended up swimming chaotic freestyle while sighting every few strokes.
But the night swim was beautiful. The water was dotted with little lights of different colours, bobbing around and reflecting on the surface, with the stars out in force above us. It really was very pretty.
Unfortunately, my dark goggles kept fogging up and some people’s lights were either very dim or hidden behind inflatables, so there were a few near collisions! After 6 laps I decided I’d had enough and simply floated on my back holding onto my tow float, gently kicking to keep moving while taking in the spectacular view.
I was very glad to get out and hand over the baton to Andy!
I didn’t manage much kip afterwards. Between the stuffy nose making breathing difficult and knowing I had to get up again at 3.30am to be ready for my 4am swim, sleep wasn’t exactly forthcoming.
I squeezed myself into my dry thermal wetsuit. Lovely and warm, but not exactly designed for leisurely breaststroke!
I borrowed Emma’s clear goggles as I took her place in the water. They weren’t much better, to be honest. 😂 So I ended up mostly floating around doing a strange breaststroke/doggy paddle combination, while watching bats diving through the misty surface to catch insects. Faint pop music floating over the water from one of the kayaks... It felt surreal. And disorientating. And I felt pretty ill and very cold. I was constantly watching the exit for the lights to change from green to red to signal that my time was up… but somehow still managed 4 laps!
After a quick warm shower to wash off the Eau de Pond, which fortunately I couldn’t smell, but was apparently the complaint of all my teammates, I managed to get a few hours shuteye before loud music and relentless tannoy announcements at 8am made further snoozing impossible.
I slunk out of the camper and went to see how everyone else was doing. By now everyone was looking pretty done in, but with only a few hours to go, spirits were still high.
10am was my final shift. I was feeling considerably better than during the night, so decided I might as well get stuck in and see how many laps I could manage. I have to say, I’ve never done it before, but I REALLY do not like swimming around in circles! 😂
After 9 laps I slowed down a bit and, thankfully, just missed the cut-off to go around again and was directed out of the loop towards the finish.
Andy was the final swimmer, so we sent him off with a huge cheer before getting into our matchy-matchy swimming cosies from Own The Adventure and heading into the water to join him for the final lap.
And this was one of the highlights of the whole weekend. All the teams joined together for a huge, silly, inflatable-filled victory lap. There were daft hats, floats, smiles everywhere and a real sense of we actually did it! 🥳
It was tough at times. It was tiring. I probably shouldn’t have been swimming with a cold. And I’m still not entirely sure why anyone thought swimming around in circles for 24 hours was a good idea… 😂
But doing something new and challenging ourselves, with great friends, in such a beautiful location, for such a worthwhile cause made it all incredibly special.
A huge thank you to my best Mermates and to the brilliant team at Level Water for organising such a fantastic event. 💙
And, of course, a massive thank you to everyone who sponsored us.
Our team sponsorship page is still open, so if you can spare a quid or two, we’d be incredibly grateful. 🙏
Level Water funds swimming lessons for children with disabilities - for some, it can be their only opportunity to take part in physical activity. The benefits go far beyond learning to swim, supporting both physical and mental wellbeing, confidence and independence.
So if you can spare a few pounds, please consider donating. Every little bit helps. 💙🏊♀️ link in comments x
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