Charity SOLO English Channel Swim
Donation protected
Hi everyone
My name is William Rylance. Having entered a number of Marathon swim events in the past, I am attempting a SOLO SWIM of the the English Channel (EC) to celebrate my 60th birthday in June 2024. My wife tells me a party would be much easier and cheaper!
I will be raising funds for Parkinson’s.org and the RNLI.
Both charities are close to my heart as my Father-in-law passed away from the former and being an open water swimmer, I believe it’s compulsory to choose the RNLI as a kind of good luck charm in the hope that I never have to call on their services!
To give you some background to my dream/challenge, settle in and I’ll give you some info.
EARLY YEARS
The eldest of 3 children, we had a family caravan in Essex and were all brought up swimming in the North Sea. I used to go out on my own as I got older, and once around the age of 14 I swam out to the pier, managed to get around 80% of the way back to my parents and only realised the tide had turned when I saw my Dad frantically waving and encouraging me back to the shore. I’d have made it home eventually but would have been swimming for probably another 5 hours at least. Note to adult self…..check the tide times!
I competed for my home town in lots of competitions but I will never forget the very first challenge that I was sponsored to do. My Dad said he would give me 50p per length of our local pool to give me something to aim for. Cue Will swimming 1500m or 50 lengths! He paid up £25.00 and for the 1970’s I felt like a millionaire for a little while.
THE DREAM
From the beach at Walton-on-the-Naze where our family caravan was sited, I used to take a small dinghy and bob out on the water as a change from swimming. I can still remember that I thought I could see the beaches in France and Belgium. It only occurred to me as an adult that it couldn’t possibly have been either of those countries as they were both over 100k away! It did maybe trigger a desire to swim the EC though, a dream that was only given free rein around 47 years later!
THE CHALLENGE
Who could ever talk about swimming the EC without seeing the wonderful and amazing Victoria Wood sketch where her 12-year-old character Chrissie attempted the same? The sadness of seeing her set off with her duffel bag, sandwich box and carton of milkshake is never lost on me and if I do succeed, I’ll toast Victoria and thank her for all the other laughs she gave the world.
Using data from 2022, information shows that one of mankind’s greatest challenges - climbing Mt Everest - an amazing 678 people made it to the summit. Incredible!
Taking nothing away from those epic winners, it was quite sobering to read that only 122 people completed the EC with 78 of those being solo swims. Wow, wow, wow!
To say the EC is a big swim is a classically English understatement. The distance is approximately 21 miles but taking into account the effect of the tides, it is a lot further. Water temperatures will be around 14 Celsius. This will mean I will be fighting to stay warm, while the sea is trying to leach all of the heat from my body. Never mind the actual density of the water (800 times greater than air) which means I have to work so much harder to ‘push’ through the sea.
In the middle of the EC is an area, scarily called “THE SEPARATION ZONE”.
It’s around 9 nautical miles wide including the two shipping lanes, and contains delights such as jellyfish, sewage and basically all of the crud and waste that the large tankers and vessels that use the shipping lanes belch out. Nice!
You may or may not be aware, but to comply with the Channel Swimming Association (CSA) rules, I will only be wearing some small swim briefs (budgie smugglers for those of a certain age!), goggles and a silicone hat. With an anticipated swim time of around 14 hours, that should surely be enough to cope with everything it has to throw at me?
TRAINING / COMPETITIONS
DAILY TRAINING
I lead regular training sessions at Bedworth Pool every weekday morning before work. These sessions are based around a 1 mile distance, with plans designed to increase endurance while working on increasing race pace.
OPEN WATER TRAINING
Open water swimming is a drug. I spend between 4-6 hours every week swimming in open water unless training for an event such as the EC or The Dock2Dock in London.
This time may increase by 8-10 hours, meaning a total of 12 to 14 hours in open water.
My training is mainly done in Stoney Cove National Dive Centre in Leicestershire.
BRISTOL CHANNEL RELAY
In 2022 I was drafted into a 6 person team to swim the Bristol Channel. The Ilfracombe to Swansea route, a distance of 25.5 miles. We became the first none wet-suit (Skins) team to ever complete the swim. Having swum through the night fighting against continual jellyfish stings, we were treated to a visit at dawn by a pod of dolphins. You can imagine the incredible boost this was to team morale.
Unfortunately the swim wasn't ratified due to the landing point chosen by the pilot. All credit to him though it made for some amazing photos when I "landed" the swim.
ICE MILE
I am Ice Mile swimmer No.433.
I swam my mile in Doncaster in 2022 with a water temperature of 4.43 degrees Celsius and 0.6 degrees air temperature.
This was my second attempt with the first being cut short by hypothermia at around 1500m, just 100m short of the target.
GB ICE SWIMMING CHAMPIONSHIPS
In 2023 the GB Ice Swimming Championships were held at Sandford Park Lido in Chetenham. This is a 50m outdoor swimming pool in the centre of town. I entered 2 events - 500m and 100m front crawl. I won Gold in my Age Group for the 500m and Silver in my Age Group in the 100m.
DOCK2DOCK
I successfully completed the 15k swim at the Dock2Dock event in 2023 with a finish time of 5 hours 40 mins, giving me Silver in my age group. The Royal Victoria and Albert docks in London is a fantastic venue. Canary Wharf at the westerly end is a beautiful sight at night.
SWIM EXMOOR
Swim Exmoor (6K) has been my season finale since 2018. Being held at the end of September this can be either a total pleasure or as hard a swim as can be. I have finished this swim as fresh as a daisy and on a different year finished suffering from hypothermia, barely crawling across the finish line.
BANTHAM SWOOSH
Bantham Swoosh is an absolute dream of a swim. Following the retreating tide the swim is the length of the river Avon from Aveton Gifford to the beach at Bantham. The spin off from this event - the Boomerang Swoosh - was also an amazing experience, swimming from Bantham towards Aveton Gifford until the tide changed, forcing us back down the river towards an amazing sunset over Burgh Island.
DART 10k
In 2019 I completed the Dart 10k in 2 hours 23 mins. This is another terrific tide-assisted swim starting in the center of Dartmouth swimming downstream to Salcombe in Devon. My companions at the halfway feeding station were a couple of local seals. I wasn't sharing my jelly babies with them so I showed them a clean pair of heels.
FALMOUTH RNLI CASTLE 2 CASTLE SWIM
This is the only swim I do in a wetsuit! The swim is a 1 mile dash from Pendennis Castle across the Carrick Roads to St Mawes Castle. The water around Cornwall has to be some of the best in the world for swimming, crystal clear and azure blue. I will use any excuse at any time of the year just to get my fix of Cornish Swimming.
I can say with pride, I throw myself into and even sometimes 'out of' this event. See video below.
NON-COMPETITIVE HIGHLIGHTS
Between June 1st and November 4th 2018, Ross Edgley Extreme Athlete and sports scientist swam around the coast of the UK, taking 157 days to complete the 1,792 mile trip around the coastline of mainland Great Britain. Starting and ending in Margate, Redbull - one of the main sponsors of the event - chose 100 swimmers to swim 1 mile off shore and welcome Ross back to Margate. I was one of the lucky few selected, and one of even fewer who chose to enter a chilly sea without a wetsuit. On meeting Ross and shaking his hand, he claimed I was a "Total Legend" for swimming in skins. This from a man who had just completed a task thought to be impossible. I even got to meet Ant Middleton from SAS Who Dares Wins.
TESCO CHRISTMAS ADVERT
In 2017, Tesco wanted swimmers to appear in their Christmas advert filmed in the Serpentine in London. The idea was the hero of the piece would be filmed emerging from the water (having spent about 5 seconds up to his knees) while the rest of the cast (the hardened winter swimmers) swam backwards and forward in the background. What a brilliant day! We got to swim in the Serpentine, in very cold water AND they paid us. BONUS i say!
THANK YOU
If you’ve made it this far, THANK YOU.
You're probably thinking you could have swum the channel yourself in the time it's taken to read this!
Long Distance or Marathon Swimming is known as the loneliest team sport in the world. Spending multiple hours in almost total sensory deprivation, with ear plugs shutting out the noise and just a sneak peak at the outside world on each breath. The team in this arena are the crew who offer support and motivation, monitor your health and ensure you have the required nourishment to complete the task. I know I wouldn’t be able to even attempt this challenge without the wonderful support of my family and friends. It gives me the strength to throw myself into my training, so that I can give it my all on the day, to say THANK YOU to them in return.
And that all brings us nicely to the whole point of this bio. The charities.
If you would like to be a part of my journey, please click on the yellow 'Donate' button below.
As with any fundraising event they and I personally would be very grateful for even the smallest amount. It’s true that every penny really does help.
A small percentage will be used towards the costs of the swim itself which will total over £5k.
I’ll be adding photos and updates throughout the process, so please check back regularly and I will do everything in my power to do your donation justice and be able to celebrate my 60th birthday by adding my name to the honour roll of English Channel swimmers.
See you in the water…..
William Rylance
Updates
05/01/2024
HAPPY NEW YEAR!
It’s all starting to get a little bit real now.
In the last month of 2023, I achieved a total swim distance of 1 MILLION metres! YES!
1,000,000 metres or 1,000 km, Total distance for the year was 1,050 km - give or take a few metres…
Lesley helped me celebrate by posting the meme below:
Christmas and New Year.
We spent Christmas Eve and Day in Weymouth where I entered the Weymouth Parkrun finishing 166th out of 470 and 9th in my age category. After the parkrun, we moved to Weymouth docks and entered the Christmas Day harbour swim where I finished 3rd in my heat.
We even got a mention in the local paper!
Training.
I started my training between Christmas and New Year. Both were pool swims and the first was with 4 Members of the Steady Away Swimmers - my morning swim group encouraging them to achieve their Swim England 5km Badge and Certificate.
Swim 2 was a 6.4km or 4 mile swim taking just over 2 hours, swimming 256 lengths of our local 25m pool.
These types of swims are important training for the monotony of the EC - 12 strokes & turn, 12 strokes & turn, repeated over and over helping me find the happy place in my mind that I will need to find on the day of the swim.
I have set myself an additional challenge for January of 30 press-ups per day. it doesn’t sound a lot but when you haven’t done them for … a while….. it’s a bit of a shock to the system. Will keep you posted!
*Update: 15.02.24 – Have continued to do 30 press ups every day since Jan 1st.
News for 2024
We spoke to the lovely people at https://beachbumsup.com/collections/brobes
and Max has kindly provided one of their ‘Brobes’ to keep me warm before and after my swim. (Product review to follow).
Finally, I have found the perfect PINK Swim trunks courtesy of Funky Trunks (Sorry for the pose, this dates to a 5-year-old Will on the beach at Walton) I will track down the original and post that too.
February and I am still going!
I have decided that I need to be training with an energy deficit. To that end I now run 5k every morning before my standard swim session. I believe that this, combined with a Masters Session then a distance swim (4k plus combined) every Wednesday evening means that by Thursday I am swimming in deficit. If I’m not, it certainly feels that way!
To be honest the running thing has got me hooked, I will be running the Yeovil Half Marathon on 24th March, so thought it would be a good idea to see how I would cope with the distance. I would have liked to have been a little quicker, but the results below weren’t too bad for my first half.
All of my training can be viewed at https://www.strava.com/athletes/wilf_rylance or if you use Strava yourself please feel free to follow me, and give me an occasional KUDOS if you feel my efforts warrant it.
Thank you everyone, we are 10% of the way to our goal…
Thoughts on Channel Swimmers from a bygone era……
Organizer
William Rylance
Organizer
England