Day 276 - Friday 17th June 2011

No early morning swim today as I have a business meeting at 6.30am, followed by another at 11.30 and another at 1.00 and another at 3.00. If I could work my way across the channel in meetings then that would be a tad easier.

Feeling rather low today about the swim. Reg, my pilot boat, has confirmed that he can let me have a mid September slot, but it seems that the CSA won’t allow me to register other swimmers this year. Also Reg’s slot is on the second Tide as a Fourth swimmer. This basically means we miss the best first tide completely and then have to wait for three other swimmers to either succeed or fail in that week before we get our shot. If the weather is bad for any of those swimmers then they keep their position before me and I am moved on. With this being right at the end of the season and only having a single week as a window and 3 swimmers ahead of me on that week it is simply like being at the back of the pack in a grand prix driving an old mini and expecting to not only win the race but also finish the race. Even forgetting the CSA’s refusal to register more swimmers for this season for my relay, it seems taking this slot gives us the least possible chance.

What on earth does one do! I so want to complete this challenge; I’ve put over a year and a half of my energy, my time, my life into this and it’s all I’ve been thinking about since I first stepped into the sea last April (2010). To have the realisation that I can’t do this as a solo swim was both devastating and exhausting, but at least I clung to the possibility of a relay this year. Now it seems that it is unlikely to happen.

Having read a number of channel swimmers stories and spoken to some real life channel swimmers and future attempters I have come across more who have not been able to swim on their first attempt than those who have been able to; it seems delays of “years” due to weather or illness seems to be the norm. My plan of learning to swim and then successfully swimming all in just over a year seems now to be crazy; I hate the word impossible, but it certainly seems that way.
I will have to give this some major thought over the weekend and then sit down with Fiona and see whether she thinks the CSA will simply refuse to let me do it this year with a relay and if I am being daft taking a 4th position of a second tide at the end of the season; I just don’t want to end up not only disappointing myself and my amazing supporters but also have a team of swimmers also facing disappointment simply because “I” wanted to do it this year rather than plan it for next year.

I’ll certainly complete my solo 21 miles along the coast of Brighton this year, no one can stop me doing that and for someone who could barley swim a year ago that will be a great achievement on it’s own. But I will not give up on the Dover - France channel swim and if elements out of my control force me into next year as a relay then I have to be as strong as Fiona was and deal with it; she was delayed 3 years and still went ahead; that is the kind of resolve I need to have.