Swimathon 2018 takes place this weekend

Both I and my son John will be taking part in Swimathon 2018 this weekend. For me this marks a quarter century of swimming for charity. If all goes well it will be the 25th consecutive year in which I have completed the 5,000 metre challenge.

I first took part in the Swimathon twenty-four years ago in 1994. In the intervening period, if my memory is not playing tricks on me, I have taken part at various different pools in Hemel Hempstead, St Albans, Bricket Wood, Harpenden, Norwich, Cockermouth, Ulverston, Preston, Workington, Wigton and Whitehaven depending on where I was at the time and which pools were taking part in Swimathon that year.

This weekend I will be taking the plunge in my local pool and fitness centre, Copeland pool in Hensingham, Whitehaven.

The Swimathon is Britain’s largest charity swim, and gives people of very varied swimming abilities an opportunity to raise money for charity by swimming distances of up to 5,000 metres. The 2018 Swimathon event is in aid of Marie Curie, who look after thousands of terminally ill people, and also, for the first time, Cancer Research UK, one of the world’s leading cancer charities.

Marie Curie, the UK’s leading charity for people with any terminal illness and their families, has been Swimathon's charity partner ten times since it launched in 1986 and the event has raised over £17 million for the charity through the event during that time.

In total Swimathon has raised £48 million pounds for 36 charities over the past thirty-one years - and we are hoping to break the £50 million barrier this weekend!

A big thank you to the people who have already sponsored me this year and those who sponsored me or any other Swimathon participant in the past.

If you sponsor me, or any of the other swimmers taking part in the world’s biggest fundraising swimming event, you will be supporting two incredible causes. You can do so online via my Justgiving page at:

https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/chris-whiteside2018

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