Day 169 - 14th January 2011

Another Pilchard day today unfortunately. The sea was once again crazy and strong, so we headed over to the girly beach to seek protection from the pier, but like the rest of the week there was little protection to be had.

The only people to actually get right in and swim out was Shoichi (spelt correctly at long last!) and Me!! We both basically watched the waves, then on a slim clearance just went for it. Once we were out passed the Pier sign it was an easy swim, just the odd high rise wave to climb over. Getting back in, of course, was another story! This took some serious concentration and planning as the waves were quite monster hitting the shore. Shoichi went in first and timed it well, followed a few seconds later by me who timed it almost well. I was OK, it was just a final wave that spun me a little, but nothing much and Big Bob and Mike were on hand to pull me out in case I needed it. Little Bob of course took lead Pilchard position again and the very few with us also had a lie down, with Big Bob looking like he was having the time of his life ; I almost had to convince him it was time to go back to the Arch and become an adult again.

Hopefully next week the sea will be a little more gentle with us and let us have a swim as the temperature, whilst still cold, hit 6.1 degrees which would let us stay in a lot longer than usual. At this temperature we could easily do a 15 minute swim I reckon.

Yesterday after my swim (or non swim) I went to Varndean School along with my brother-in-law Darren to present certificates to our first full CHOCS children (see http://www.starrtrust.com/chocs). Chocs is our schools project and is amazing!!! You really should go on our site and look at it, it’s an incredible project. Chocs stands for Children Helping Other Children Smile. Through the Chocs project Varndean school children raised over £2,500 for CCHF; one of our charities, and the Chocs children were just amazing. I am so very very proud of them all. The next Chocs year has now started at Varndean with the new Year 10 children and we are so proud to also have the Grand Hotel Brighton partnering us with it; they are being absolute stars. Keep watching the website or my blog for more info on this.

Last night we held our first Club 21 Networking event for the Starr Trust. It was at the Lansdowne Place Hotel in Brighton and was attended by over 40 people; a mix of the 21 charities we’re supporting and some of our business supporters. It was great to see so many people there and all getting to know each other and talking about their experiences; very exciting indeed. We officially launched the list of the 21 charities that will be supported by the Swim4Smiles campaign and played our promotional video, which is also now being put on our website; so have a look next week as it’s great. The next networking 21 Club event will be even better and is not to be missed – if you’re local to Brighton you should come along.

The total raised towards our £100,000 target is just hitting £20,000, which is a great start, but still a long way to go!

Another week over, another week closer and another week wetter!