GregInTheWater
GLASGOW OPEN WATER SWIMMING COACH
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I am writing this blog entry during the late May bank holiday weekend in 2020. Normally at this time of year, I would be swimming as often as possible, enjoying the relative warmth of Loch Lomond as the spring sun heats it up past 10c. I used to think I would die when I first exposed myself to water of that temperature; but now I celebrate it, as I know that summer… Read More
One of my swim pals Gary was training for a non-wetsuit attempt on the length of Loch Lomond, a swim of 36 km. As part of that training, we had done the Inchtavannach and Inchconnachan loops several times, building up to distances of 5.5km. The warm summer of 2018 had continued, with the water in Loch Lomond between 19.5c and 20.5c, which was very pleasant for my 2km morning swims with The… Read More
As the winter settled in Scotland, I took some time to get over the disappointment I felt from the ice km event. I knew that I had to get more cold water swims in all-weather conditions, to prepare me for any future attempts. Luckily, the area around Glasgow is ideal for winter swimming, with plenty of locations to choose from. Our normal swim time is 9am on a Saturday morning, and in… Read More
I had noticed that an ice swimming event had been arranged at Bardowie Loch on the north side of Glasgow, to be held in February 2018. After dipping my toe in the water of an ice event at the GB Champs in Loch Lomond in February 2017, I decided to train for this event. My plan was to enter the 1km ice swim. Now you might ask what an ice swim is?… Read More
Well 2017 was certainly another fantastic year with lots of swimming adventures. I will get the boring statistics out of the way first:- I competed in three swimming events with top ten finishes in all of them; I swam a total of 285 km on 167 different swims of which 140 of the swims were outdoors; I swam in six countries over the year: Portugal, Greece, Montenegro, Croatia, England and of course… Read More
After my return from the trip to Montenegro and Croatia, it was time to prepare for winter swimming. I was planning to swim through this winter without the wetsuit or as they say in this part of the world skins. My plan was simple, keep swimming in the Scottish lochs in skins while the water temperature continued its slide into winter. I had made some progress the previous winter, but this year… Read More
It seems like months since I have posted a swim story on this blog, so you probably think that I have been out of the water. Well, no I have continued my swim adventures, and now after the summer of 2017, it is time to get more up to date. I swam through the winter of 2016 in the lochs of Scotland wearing a wetsuit, and yes it was not pleasant,… Read More
After the first leg of our swim down Loch Lomond from Ardlui to Tarbet, we returned the following weekend for leg two. This leg would start at Tarbet Pier (where we finished leg one), and finish at Luss, a distance of around 13km. We arranged to meet at Luss with one kayaker and five swimmers being the van man, the rose, the actor, the slow one and myself. The weather forecast was… Read More
Being summer time in Scotland with so many incredible places to swim, we needed a goal. So a group of us came up with the idea of swimming the length of Loch Lomond over three legs. Due to our busy schedules, we had planned to do the first two legs on consecutive weekends in July, and the third leg in September. Of course I had already done the third leg last… Read More
It has been quite a while since I posted on this blog, with my 16 kilometre swim in Loch Rannoch the last entry. But that does not mean I have not been swimming outdoors in Scotland. Just because the nights get longer, the water gets colder and the snow starts to fall, it does not mean I have not been swimming. So after the marathon swim in September, the weather morphed into… Read More
GregInTheWater 