On the Beach at Dover

Celebratory Dinner in Dover

Our recent Cake Sale. Raised £403!

On the Beach at Dover

We’ve arrived in Dover. I have to say I’m slightly blown away, Dover is not at all what I expected. The sun is shining, the harbour flat calm and looking clean. I’m really tempted to get in there for a swim. The team are all a little giddy, we’re together all of us for the first time since January. I’m told to save myself for the training weekend, we check in and head to our rooms. I’m sharing a room with Heather and Chrissy and Somehow Heather manages to get the king size bed to herself, while Chrissy and myself have to sleep on children’s zed beds! We head down for dinner in the bar, the excited talk is obviously on swimming. Tomorrow we have a big day ahead, the whole team is nervous. On saturday morning we need to complete our two hour channel swim qualifier. For those that don’t know this is a fairly hefty task. Dover harbour’s water is a balmy 16’c, we have to swim in just our swim suits for a total of two hours non stop, doing our best to stay warm so that hyperthermia doesn’t set in.  Without this qualifier complete we won’t be allowed to swim the channel on the day. The pressure is on, its early to bed.

I wake up early, I peak out of the curtains down at the harbour. The water is still calm and the sun is out, I’m relieved and terrified all at the same time. I can see a lonely red cap (solo swimmer) already training. In the harbour the red caps are God, they are seriously training it usually takes them about two years of solid training to be deemed ready for the challenge of a solo channel crossing. To qualify the red caps must swim 6hours in Dover harbour, I am in ore.

The team mood is sombre to say the least and quite negative, a lot of grumbling and whinging. I make a decision that I need to stay positive, I decide I’m not going to utter a negative word all day. I’m not going to let us fail because of negativity. I become the annoying cheery positive one on the team. I have to be fake cheery a lot for work(I work with children). I put my work face on. Every negative comment that came my way I manage to put a new spin on it. After a while I’m annoying myself with some of the comments I come out with but I carry on regardless. We have to swim for two hours and we need to believe we can do it. Non of us have every managed to stay in open water for any where near two hours before.

We arrive beach side, there on the beach is Freda Streeta the worlds most prolific channel swimming coach. Freda has dedicated her whole life to helping swimmers swim the channel. Her own daughter is Queen of the Channel having swum 19 solo crossings. If Freda says jump, you say yes Mamm, how high Mamm? and then curtsy! We check in, we declare we are doing our qualifier. Freda gives us the nod, very good. “Today you will do your two hours, get out of the water for an hour and then get back in for another hour”. “Yes, me lady”……I mutter or something similar. Get back in again, for an HOUR…… holy flipping heck, this is not going to be fun!

By far the best bit of our beach experience is Baz the Vaz. Barry’s job is to stand on Dover beach and lube up all the Channel swimmers with Vaseline, we literally line up so that Barry can cover our semi naked bodies with Vaseline. I find the whole experience quite exciting! Barry is a true legend and every Open Water Swimming Club needs a Baz the Vaz. As soon as we’ve been lubed up we’re off in for a dip in the sea, the longest one of my life  so far. We can do it.

The water is cool but not cold, its far warmer than our training climate on the Isle of Man. We set off, two lengths of Dover harbour is something like 2.6k so we realise we only have to do it a couple of times and our two hours will hopefully be up. We decide to stick together to make the whole thing more bearable, easier said than done when there are 120 swimmers in the harbour the majority yellow caps(relay swimmers). Also not such an easy task when we’re all different abilities. We buddy up with our closest ability and stay as a group, swimming as a pod. Chrissy is so fast that she swims ahead and then swims around us in a giant circle, like a mother Minke Whale watching out for her babies.   If we lose someone we have a team call, which is mightily annoying but it worked. We’ve lost Jo, I spot her about 200meters off to our left. We all stop and do our call “Whoop, Whoop”. She stops swimming, pops her head up like a seal pup we wave frantically and then she heads back in our direction. This sort of thing happens more times than I can count during our two hours swim. It was literally a sea full of yellow hats. If a red hat came your way, you moved and quick. They have priority and they will swim over you. The two hours passed by fairly quickly really we just kept our heads down and kept warm. Regrouped, gave some positive feedback and carried on.

We did it, our two hours are up. I decide we need to stay in for an extra 5 minutes just to make sure we haven’t got the time wrong. I am not doing this again! On getting out the water, I feel good I’m not cold. We dress and sit about on the beach dressed like arctic explorers, chatting and eating sweets, I declare this is my sort of sport. I love sweets. The sun is still glaring, this has a lot to do with our positivity. The team is thrilled we have done it, the pressure is off. About half an hour later we are presented with certificates signed by Freda. This is momentous, Chrissie and I pose for Photos and laugh our heads off at how far we have come. Chrissie and I grew up together and we learnt to swim together. We did all our 5m, 10m, 25m badges at the same time, trained in squads together, so to get our Dover qualifier together was quite a moment. We felt a photo would be appropriate especially for our mums, both of which are swimming coaches and have spent far too many hours of their lives in swimming pools, this would mean a lot to them.

Then the call came to get back in, we actually don’t care. We are buzzing our second swim flies by and we even finish off with a display of our best Synchronised swimming. I genuinely thought this would impress Freda, I’m guessing from the looks we got that we probably made the opposite impression. Apparently synchronised swimming is not for the Channel. Ah well, I care not! Right, back to the hotel, then it’s time to hit the bar and head out for dinner. Yum.

The next morning I am far from positive, I do not want to get back in the harbour. I am sunburnt, every bit of me hurts. Everyone else feels the same way. We drag ourselves to the beach. Sign in…today we have to do an hour and half in, an hour out, followed by another hour and half in. I feel like telling Freda to go stuff herself but I nod and smile. The only genuine smile from the morning is when I get felt up by Baz the Vaz! We hit the water and get on with it, we’re plagued by injuries mostly we just over did it yesterday. We start dropping like flies we’re all out by an hour 15. We start the process of warming up, a few of the team head off home because they have long journeys ahead. Silla, Brandon and I are the only ones left debating whether or not to go back in. We decide not too and sneak off the beach like naughty school children. I’m not even sure I should be writing this, we may get in trouble. I care not, I got what I wanted to achieve for this weekend. I am a qualified cross Channel Swimmer and being only reserve it may be the closest I get to Swimming the Channel, I am happy. Job done. Our journey home is more than a little giddy and Heather “lumpy” mattocks has a new nick name. She is our very own “Celebrity, Model, Athlete”. I shall let her blog about it.