101 Ice Miles and counting….

I was struggling to think of what to write for a fitting review of our 100th Ice Mile milestone today luckily for me Chris Hill had it covered:

The team arrive early DCLT’s Hatfield Outdoor Activity Centre in Doncaster; there is a quiet bustle of activity. Boats are fuelled, checked and readied. The crews carefully don dry suits and buoyancy aids, collect their radios, torpedo buoys, and spare dry robes – oh, and not forgetting the all important hot drinks and snacks!

The recovery team talk through their roles; escorting swimmers to and from the water, ensuring the welfare of the swimmers for the all important first hour after exit. The complex jobs of registration, photos, videos and timings are all agreed. There is plenty of experience here, and new volunteers are shown exactly what to do, and are easily integrated into the team.

The temperature of the water is checked: 4.9ºC today so all’s well. Everything is set for the perfect sub 5ºC swim.

Our first two swimmers away are Lucy Ashdown Parkes and Jo Bolton, completing their ice miles in 33m 44s and 35m.34s respectively (str), who are followed by far the happiest Ice Swimmer we’ve ever seen, Kristie Waller, who completes her mile in 37m 39s (str). And then it happens….. Julie Davis swims the necessary two big loops to successfully complete an Ice Mile (str).

Julie becomes the 100th to achieve this amazing feat with Swim Your Swim.

She joins one of the most exclusive groups of extreme endurance sports persons in the world. Fewer than 440 individuals have achieved this accolade across 39 countries.

And then, to put the icing on the cake, our last swimmer of the day, Ian Griffiths completed his mile in 36m.06s (str) in some stirring conditions!

101 Ice Swimmers have now reached their goal with the help and support of Swim Your Swim – and there are more to come as the season continues… just more  “winter days with the team at Swim Your Swim”!

To those hardy swimmers that have attempted their miles, but didn’t quite make it: we feel your pain, and when you’re ready, we’re here to help you try again. The water’s not going anywhere, and we’ll be ready when you are.

We could print the names of all 101 swimmers who have achieved their Ice Mile status with SYS, and that may come in a later post. However, it seems more appropriate to print a ‘hall of fame’ list of all the volunteers who have been involved over the years, as they are the ones who have made reaching the 100th Ice Mile possible. If we’ve missed any names, please accept our apologies. You know who you are – we hope you know how important your contribution is, to us and the swimmers!  Thank you!

Just another winter Saturday with SYS.

We’ll be back again next week, offering encouragement and support for all swimmers from those enjoying their first winter, those training for other events all the way to ice miles.