Eton 10km

Saturday saw me and Justine attempt our first ever 10km swim. Here we are rocking the 'homeless' look before the start!

The venue was Dorney Lake which is where the rowing events will be held for London 2012... Disappointingly, we were in the not quite so impressive lake next to the main lake but to be honest, once your in and swimming you could be anywhere so it really didn't matter … I suppose !

Arriving at the lake I bumped into Colin Hill, who I swum with at the 24 hour swim in Guildford last month... Colin is a very experienced open water swimming ,and chatting to him seemed to settle some of my nerves. He is also officially the nicest , friendliest man in the world so it really was great to see him!

Things were pretty cold.. and I was a bit anxious about how cold the water would feel once we got in... the sign claimed that the temperature was 15.5 degrees.. so pretty similar to the temp of the Channel by the time we swim in July! Looking around there were a lot of wetsuited bodies hanging around... BUT a decent smattering of mentallists like me and Justine that were going to attempt to swim without a wetsuit! It was really good to know that we weren't alone in our efforts!!

The start was cold and way more aggressive than I thought it would be.. it was 10km after all... but that didn't stop swimmers going off like rockets and fighting their way to their own bit of water. This is the reason I know I would never like to swim an event like this as a race... its just plain scary!!

Confident that I could find my own space... and my own pace, I tried to get out of the crowds (easier said than done) and get on with things!

The 10km consisted of 3 laps of the lake... my sighting .. as ever .. was shocking, but I found the 'lane lines' and tried to follow them when I could see them! After the first lap I felt fine, but could no longer feel my feet as they were that cold... I started to worry about how I would actually exit the lake with my 'dead man's feet' !!

My watch had been bashed in the hustle and bustle of the start so I had no idea how I was swimming speed wise, but I just kept on in my little bubble.. at my own pace... singing Queen's 'Don't stop me now' in my head (it had been playing over the tannoy before the start and seemed to fit in quite well with what we were doing!!)... when I got bored of queen I started repeating my little mantra (given to me by Bryn Dymott who is another Wild Swimmer!) of 'I am WARM.. and i'm doing well' and it really did help me to forget the cold and just carry on!

I didn't bother with feeding or drinking.. I just couldn't be bothered to stop!!! I didn't feel any ill effects from not feeding so it seemed to work for me!!

The last lap was not quite so comfortable as the other 2 but it still felt much better than I had expected! .. it was great to pass people that were wearing wetsuits and feel that little bit of pride that I was doing it the hard way!!

I passed the yellow buoy for the final time and tried to work out with the F*** the finish was!!!... I just followed someone else in the end.. arriving at the end to be told I had to run to the timing thing... stagger is a more appropriate description of how I chose to do it!! My face in the photo below sums it up !!

I heard the announcer say that I was 4^th female out ( turns out I was 5^th but hey ho!) and then the announcer exclaimed with some surprise in her voice '...AND WITHOUT A WETSUIT'.. I felt so proud!!

I got to the tent and tried to Ride The Shakes out! .. it took a while but soon enough I was warm and back to normal despite a few bumps, bruises and bites (from insects rather than swimmers.. altho there was one marking on my hand that looked human!!)

My time of 2:37:58 put me 30^th overall (male and female) and 5^th female... and 1^st in my age group category. Justine came 6^th in our category in 3:12 … Not bad for out first ever 10 km!

I can't say i'd rush to do another one... but I did really enjoy it and it was great practise and confidence building for the Channel!

More local support from F.Bailey & Son High Class Family Butchers

So the story goes a little something like this....... I love PORK PIES, it's a fact; one that maybe I haven't declared in front of many of my female friends. Anyway my friend Caz has a very clever Dad who just so happens to make pork pies. And not just any old pork pie, the official Melton Mowbray Pork Pie, which only a very small and exclusive minority of butchers can make. They're so special that even Jamie Oliver has bought one from Caz's Dad!

So Caz's Dad has very kindly offered to sponsor Channeling Positivity with a weekly PORK PIE to help Kate and I (especially me) to fuel up for the big swim. And I have to say they are bloody gorgeous and last barely 36 hours in my house!

So I say to all of you secret lovers of the PORK PIE - go now, move with hast to F.Bailey and Son High Class Family Butchers and bags yourself one, two or even three today!

Thank you Lady Bay and visitors to Open Gardens

Just a quick thank you to all of the Lady Bay garden visitors that I managed to chat to over the weekend. Everyone showed a genuine interest in the channel swim and made a much needed donation towards our £15 000 target for Teenage Cancer Trust.

Both Kate and I are really looking forward to the big swim on the 25th July and if you need to get in touch with us, please feel free to leave a comment underneath; visit our Facebook site at Justine-Kate Channel-Swim or email at channelswim2011@yahoo.com

NLP

Last night i had my first ever NLP session with Louisa Lera at the Natural Health Centre in Nottingham.

It was so great!

After seeing David Walliams being hypnotised by Paul McKenna before his Channel swim, I thought it may be worth a shot to help with my fears and concerns about our forthcoming challenge.

My main fears are focussed around swimming in the dark and swimming with unknown creatures (not justine.. i know her lol!!)

To cut a long story short.. by the end of the session my fear about the 4 foot long 'sneaky and sly', slimy sludgy brown fish creatures that might swim next to me... had turned into a sausage that was swimming next to me and keeping me company and actually guiding me and helping me through the swim!! I know how mad that sounds... but every time i think of the sludgy brown things.. within seconds they have turned into funny swimming sausages!!!!!

I left the session feeling really happy.. and SO excited about the swim.. and instead of being scared of certain aspects.. i now feel that they will only add to the whole experience!

It really is fascinating and Louisa has suggested that i come back to see her again nearer the swim so that we can work on some other things.

Louisa has also, very kindly offered to donate 10% of her fee for my sessions to the Teenage Cancer Trust, which is such a lovely thing to do. I have been really overwhelmed by the generosity of people we have worked with throughout this project, also this week one of my work friends, Reg has arranged to donate some money raised through a Jamie Oliver party she's having! It it really appreciated and we can't thank people enough!

Just and Kate on the BBC - The Big Splash Campaign!

Will Just and Kate make it ?

AWESOME PHOTO

thanks to Mike from the Channel Swimmer Forum for sharing this photo... i have added a little bit to it.. can you tell what?.... lol

Open Water Training starts...

Friday saw me tentatively dipping my toe into the murky (and cold) waters of Holme Pierrepont for the first time this year!

I decided to go 'sans wetsuit' seeing as I need to start getting used to the cold water.. Justine will be doing the same on Wed night (unfortunately I have a hairdressers appointment lol!!)

I have no idea of the temperature on Friday, but luckily we were blessed with sunshine which always helps!... a real guess would be 12 degrees.. but I am not sure what I am basing that on!!

I tried to block out the other swimmers exclamations as to how cold it was as they were getting in ... in their wetsuits... and just did what I did in Hunstanton; got in and got on with it!! Its a very different mind set when you know you HAVE to do something in order to prepare for the big swim... there really is no backing out!

Anyways.. i lasted the full session which was probably about 50 / 55 mins and was ready to get out then!!... a warm shower and a hot choc.. and no shakes.. BRILLIANT!!! (if only they could put a hot tub / shower on the boat when we swim the channel then that would be ace!!)

I felt confident that I could get back in again another 5 times and do the whole thing again (which will be what I think we will have to do on the big day!) so all in all a good experience!

Our 24 hour swim challenge

so this weekend Justine and I took part in the 2swim4life 24 hour swim challenge... and what a challenge it was!

The aim was to swim a mile, every hour, on the hour for 24 hours... at Guildford Lido

The challenge started at 10am and Justine and I set off at a nice steady pace, me in lane 1 with Colin, Danny, Kim and Cheryl and Justine in lane 2 with 'Her Boys'. The water certainly felt a LOT colder than the 24 degrees we'd been told it would be, which made it hard to keep a steady pace as everything inside was telling us to speed up to try and keep warm! Luckily it was a glorious sunny day, so those first few hours weren't too bad, as we were able to warm up in the half an hour rest we were getting before having to set off again!

We got ourselve into a little routine with the help of our 'Buddies' Emma, Laura and Dani (without them i think we would have lasted about ten minutes.. they were amazing!) we'd swim our 32 lengths (50 m pool) jump out and get dried off and into a dry cozzie and warm clothes.. then back to the tent / picnic blankets to rest up and try eat some food and take on some fluids.. great practise for the Channel swim.

we both found that eating little bits often seemed to work, and i for one didn't struggle with feeling hungry or thirsty at any point... altho i did discover that too much 'go-go juice' makes me windy!!!!

The factor 50 suncream was essential.. and even through that we both have lovely pink faces complete with goggle marks!

Miles 6 and 7 came and went.. and gradually the air temperature started to drop.. this was when we both started to struggle.. not with the swimmming, but with getting and staying warm after the swim.. even whilst wearing thermals, hats, gloves tracksuits and big coats and being inside a sleeping bag and tent

As the hours went on my pace slowed a little from 22:30 mins to about 25 mins by mile 11.

It was after mile 11 that i made the decision to stop at 12 miles. For both justine and I the challenge was about seeing what we could do and learning from the experience. We are still in heavy training and we needed to be sensible, and as more and more little signs of hyperthermia started to show themselves we decided the safest thing to do would be to call it a day and get ourselves warm and healthy! The last thing we wanted was to come away from this injured or poorly!

It was a great decision!!!! My last mile felt great (!?) i did it in 24:30 and i was pleased to be heeading home in a nice warm car feeling proud of what we had achieved.

Things i have learnt from this:
1 go go juice makes me burp and trump... lots
2 its hard to keep a steady pace when your cold.. we must work on this!
3 food that worked well for me were small moist things like philippas delicous lemon cake! also trying to take on small amouts of fluid often (although the regular trips tpo the loo were getting a bit tedious (i must learn to wee whilst swimming!)
4 we both need to try really hard to get fatter
5 we both need to get some seriously warm clothes for the boat
6 our swimming is strong and between us we both covered over half the channel distance (which is what we need to do on the day)
7 support and a positive mental attitude is essential. Our Buddies were awesome in helping sort our heads out and helping us remember to eat and drink
8 travel lodges suck ass

i think thats about everything!... it was a great event and we were swimming with some great people that really helped support and get us through! I will look forward to seeing who finished the full 24!

we'll pop some photos up when we get a chance!