I’ve toiled with the idea of writing a blog for a number of years. Many people have asked me to start writing and documenting my swim adventures around the world. If I’m honest, I’m more nervous about a personal blog going live than a 20-mile swim across a channel! But, I’ve decided to give it a go.

This blog will take a while to get going and I’ll need time to fill in all the pieces for you but stick with it and I’m sure I’ll find my style. I’ve completed a number of marathon swims and will get around to blogging about these later but for the moment I’m going to concentrate on my Catalina Channel swim.

September 24^th 2018 will be my third attempt at the Catalina Channel.

Attempt number 1 ended approximately 1.5 hours into the swim in June 2017. Nothing short of a disaster. Piercing pain in the ear that spread across my head. There was no way I would have been able to continue for another 10 hours approximately. To say I was bitterly disappointed would be an understatement. I had 2 crew with me that day, my brother Kyle and my father-in-law Kevin Griffin. Both were extremely encouraging and kept my spirits up for our remaining few days in California.

Attempt number 2 was in October 2017. I faired a bit better this time. 5 hours approximately. I was flying it. I was just over half way into the swim and on target for finishing in a great time, the lights of the coast getting brighter, lovely calm water, it was swimming utopia! However, gradually I started getting lower back pains that turned into spasms. No matter how I stretched and turned the spasms just seemed to get worse. So much so that it got to the point that I was unable to continue. Disaster had struck again. I was again lucky this time with my crew.  There were 4 crew with me this time.  Kevin, Tomás Moynihan my sister-in-law’s husband, Tomás Finneran my business partner and Orlando.  Orlando (physical therapist extraordinaire) was on hand to ease out my back when I got back on board. Again, my crew were top class and we enjoyed the remainder of the trip travelling around LA.

The failures experienced have made me a stronger open water swimmer mentally and I truly believe that these will propel me to complete not only the Catalina Channel but other epic swims too.

We are now only 29 days away from my Catalina Channel swim. I’m going to blog about the lead up to the swim and will do some live video on the days approaching so you can all get a better idea of the planning, training and logistics that are involved!!! Open water swimming is a minority sport but hopefully more of you will get the bug and start swimming in the sea. There really is nothing like it.

My blog post tomorrow will cover my preparation and a swim I completed T-30 days from the swim.

Stay posted!

K.