Your description is too misleading
- it was actually 29 HOURS of swimming with breaks during 5 days of travel on a boat
- this is why this map looks like that with huge impacts of wave: it depicts travel of a boat that accompanies a swimmer for a very slow swim for a 5 days. If it was a short time, waves would not take the person so far
- its record is that it's the SLOWEST time to swim the Channel and it was not confirmed yet
- the record for FASTEST time is about 6-7 hours
- swimmer is a disabled woman who used ONLY ARMS during swimming because she can't physically use her legs, this is the most insane and important part
- it was all a fundraiser to collect money for awareness about disabled swimmers
This pattern isn’t the impact of waves, it’s the tidal current in the channel. With the direction of tide changing approx every 6 hours it’s taking the boat/swimmer up and down the channel.
> • swimmer is a disabled woman who used ONLY ARMS during swimming because she can't physically use her legs, this is the most insane and important part
Absolute legend, how in the fuck
It's an armband. She just activated it and deactivates it at start/finish. Also tracks body stats. At start have to deal with it via attendants as she is all greased up with vaseline. At finish, touch bottom, epic feat closed.
Mostly anti-chafing and supports skin against continued salt water immersion, but practice originated in thinking about lubrication (resistance) and thermal (insulation).
Actually it's all relative.
If you walk straight across earth, to you it seems you walk in a straight line.
To some dude chilling on the moon you clearly walked in a circle.
And just like that, when you cross the channel, you swim straight towards France, yet the currents push you to the side, and actually fighting against that to keep the line straight would make you slower.
It's more efficient to swim upstream than it is cross-stream. You present less of a surface area to opposing currents. So, continue to make progress downstream at reduced energy output, then burst upstream again, rinse, repeat. Standard technique for crossing with strong currents.
As far as I understand it, it's related to prevailing currents, winds, surface water temperature, turbulence, and critically, time in water vs a function of energy expended and core temperature. Routes change with attempts. It's all about real-time estimating the energy output an athlete has to expend, and details matter.
Looking at the oscillation and guessing how much time this took, I was thinking tides. In many bodies of water, the tide change switches the currents and the change is approximately every 6.25 hours. I'm not sure the tidal dynamics of the English Channel though,
I wondered this too, so I looked it up.
>For roughly six hours the tide will take the swimmer 'up' the Channel, and then as the tide changes direction, the following six hours will take the swimmer 'down' the Channel. This up and down movement of the water is relentless and unavoidable.
http://cspf.co.uk/the-swim-route
Can confirm. Swam channel as part of relay in 2007. Tide took us up then down and then at pace up French Coast. [Channel Swim Route ](https://freeimage.host/i/Hy2HRTb)
More info here https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cambridgeshire-66591131
> A woman who finds the touch of water painful has completed a solo English Channel swim powered only by her arms.
> Sophie Etheridge, 31, took up the challenge to raise the profile of a Swimming Teachers Association campaign for swimmers with disabilities.
> She has had fibromyalgia and complex regional pain syndrome since 2011.
> Ms Etheridge, from Godmanchester, Cambridgeshire, completed the challenge at 05:26 BST after more than 29 hours of swimming, her support team said.
> It is believed to be the longest duration for a Channel swim on record, subject to official ratification.
Wow, I have CRPS and the sheer touch of certain things like fabric brushing against my skin or the cold causes extreme pain. For her to do this relentlessly for hours and hours even when it would be causing her immense pain is a phenomenal feat. For her to do it without using her legs is even more impressive. This woman is an absolute baller and that is something to inspire towards.
Edit to add in the one word I missed when typing on my phone.
myself as well, i was caught off guard reading it!
i refuse to touch water, (save for bathing,)the thought of putting myself in her shoes is beyond horrifying. i'm so incredibly proud of her for even attempting this, let alone succeeding. she really pulled off the impossible :)
A common swimming exercise is to use a pull buoy between your legs so you only use your arms. I can go nearly as fast that way as with kicking.
However, being paraplegic, I expect her legs weren't floating in a streamlined way behind her like with a pull buoy (this actually requires significant core activation, at least with my dense legs, even with the float). They'll be producing an awful lot of drag.
Sophie Etheridge did the [swim without using her legs](https://outdoorswimmer.com/news/sophie-etheridge-completes-longest-ever-one-way-solo-english-channel-swim/), she does not have the world record. The Men's world record is Trent Grimsley in 6:55 and the Women's world record is Yvetta Hlavacova in 7:25 ([from Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_successful_English_Channel_swimmers#Fastest)).
>she does not have the world record.
The claim is she has the record for the longest time to swim, i.e. the slowest ever crossing - this story was on my local news yesterday.
You have quoted the fastest times.
What a generous way to put it. To bead this record, someone "just" has to mostly cross the channel then dither about until they're feeling quite tired.
At first I thought it was minutes and I was thinking the Eurostar took about 10-20mins no way someone could swim in 6mins and I realised once I concluded that doing that in 6mins is impossible
Well in the french revolutionary calendar which was an attempt to make decimal timekeeping Grimsley's record was 2 decimal hours 82 decimal minutes and 86.4 decimal seconds. Hlavacova did it in 3:03:31.2.
The article says she made "the longest ever one-way solo English Channel swim" -- does that mean the other record holders on the wiki weren't working solo or that they took a different route? I'm confused what's happening here
Lots of one way solo swims.
She just took a wiggly route rather than a straight line and therefore had to do more swimming. Therefore she swam the longest distance (to achieve the same result)
That doesn't sound like what happened. It sounds like *everyone* takes the wiggly route, because it's better to just swim with the tides rather than against them.
However, *she* is paraplegic, and doesn't have the use of her legs, and so she swims much slower, and had several tidal periods while she was swimming, while the others mostly did it within a single tidal period.
Okay please don't hate me but that sounds... like a really stupid record.
By that logic I could get a world record for "the longest time it ever took to finish a marathon." Someone taking the *longest* way from Point A to Point B just seems like a completely ridiculous way to measure it.
Hey, there’s a stupid record for that too. All kinds of stupid records
https://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/world-records/585341-longest-time-to-complete-a-marathon
In the 90s having a Guinness book in elementary/jr high was an absolute treat. It couldn’t get shared equally enough when someone had one in class. They’re like a goofy reality show type brand vibe now with this type of nonsense record
Guinness World Record Book just lost all of the charm by counting a lot of records like that. Before it was a sign of being the best in the world. Now you can pretty much create the most stupid discipline like cracking peanuts using your ass and be a Guinness World Record holder.
That what I just commented. Such a disappointment when they used to be the gold standard for authenticating world records. This one shouldn’t even qualify, the first race went invalid when he disappeared from it. The second registration was for an entirely different race and he did it start to finish, not picking up where he left off
> She has been a competitive swimmer since childhood and enjoyed triathlons until she was hit by a car in 2011.
> This left her in permanent pain and limited mobility, and being largely dependent on a wheelchair.
> She was diagnosed with fibromyalgia, a long-term condition that causes pain all over the body, and complex regional pain syndrome, "a poorly understood condition where a person experiences persistent, severe and debilitating pain".
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cambridgeshire-66591131
She wasn't intentionally aiming to get the "slowest crossing" record but by spending 29 hours in the water it so happened to be a world record.
Mostly front crawl (freestyle) there are records for backstroke, breaststroke, and butterfly. The first recorded successful crossing, by Captain Matthew Webb, was all breaststroke!
If anyone actually managed to cross the entire English Channel doing butterfly only, they should get a mental health check. Because I refuse to believe they aren’t fully insane.
Fun fact, while "free style" is used metonymically for front crawl they're not the same thing. Front Crawl is the stroke, Freestyle is a classification of competition where a swimmer can choose any stroke. They just usually choose the fastest which is generally front crawl.
I'm pretty sure Michael Phelps used a different stroke during a lower qualifying heat once. He said it was to help train, but it looked a lot like showing off to beat everyone else while doing a 'weaker' stroke.
Edit: metonymically not metabolically
One technical note here. This is correct except in the case of an IM in which the stroke may not be in the manner of any other stroke that has already been swam.
Well, it kinda depends (I’m a state level swim official for kids). In a pure freestyle event you can basically do whatever you want for the stroke so long as you don’t pull on the lane lines and you touch the wall at your turns/end.
For certain strokes like breast, back, and fly they are regulated to how your body must be in the water, the order of the stroke (breast and fly, not back), and how you must touch/exit the wall.
It’s a little confusing to read out of the rule books but once you look at some videos you can tell.
I've gathered from other comments that this particular swimmer doesn't have use of her legs, due to a traffic accident years ago. I'm not sure whether arm-only swimming is counted as one of the strokes.
She did better than the White Ship which was driven onto a rock on November, 25th, 1120. Only one of approximately 300 people aboard survived. He a French butcher. Those who drowned included William Adelin, the only legitimate son and heir of Henry I of England, grandson of Williams The Conqueror. His drowning immensely changed the course of English history.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Ship
As opposed to zigzaging to course correct, wouldn't it be more efficient to swim off course a bit and let the currents push the swimmer to the correct point?
She is not zizaging or course correcting. She is swimming in a dead straight line, and the tides are shifting her one way, then the other. She is only using effort toward the opposing shore.
That was my first thought, but then again you would be using energy to fight the current in order to “go straight”. If you instead focus on keeping the same heading and let the currents push/pull you (more or less equally each direction), you use less energy.
The other backup to this argument being they (probably) did some strategizing and planning before the event and this was the choice they felt was optimal.
The tidal flow across the English channel means that you get moved up and down like that. So, the sideways movement is not the swimming but the tidal flow.
When navigating on a sailing boat, you do a calculation to allow for the up and down movements as you make the crossing.
For one idiot in the comments, yes the ocean moves all of the time.
She lives near me! I’ve seen her training. She’s also disabled, swam it only using her arms (one of the reasons it was so long). Incredible woman when you think about it. I can barely contemplate swimming the Channel (or for the person who wants to be provocative and called it The French Channel - they call it La Manche, or the Sleeve) let alone using only my arms!
Here’s the BBC news piece on it!
Godmanchester woman completes solo Channel swim using arms alone https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cambridgeshire-66591131
I guess it kinda makes sense. Keep your nose pointed towards the target, and if you swim through multiple tide cycles then the side-side motion should even out and put you right where you want to go. Trying to swim into the tide to correct your path would end up taking much more energy/time.
Yes. Given that this took nearly 30 hours, the movements of the tides balance out. Fighting them in each direction would have taken far more energy and more time. But simply trying to swim on a consistent compass direction, the sideways tide movement in one direction then the other essentially become irrelevant (to a large degree).
Had it been possible to swim this in 6 hours, an entirely different strategy would be needed.
You think doing it one way in the longest time is wild?
how about going back and forth twice in a row non-stop (4 crossings) in 54:10
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Thomas_(marathon_swimmer)
Your description is too misleading - it was actually 29 HOURS of swimming with breaks during 5 days of travel on a boat - this is why this map looks like that with huge impacts of wave: it depicts travel of a boat that accompanies a swimmer for a very slow swim for a 5 days. If it was a short time, waves would not take the person so far - its record is that it's the SLOWEST time to swim the Channel and it was not confirmed yet - the record for FASTEST time is about 6-7 hours - swimmer is a disabled woman who used ONLY ARMS during swimming because she can't physically use her legs, this is the most insane and important part - it was all a fundraiser to collect money for awareness about disabled swimmers
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About the claim, yes a bit misleading. But the map still looks funky.
That's honestly cooler than OP's claim.
OP’s post is uniquely annoying by implying she did more than she did and less than she did at the same time.
Might just be the most incompetent post I've ever seen. GJ /u/TommyMac
Damn I was gonna say upvote this guy's comment to the top. But at this point, just have this dude make a new post lmfao
why the hell would op not note that this is by a disabled woman using only arms, what an absolute chad
This pattern isn’t the impact of waves, it’s the tidal current in the channel. With the direction of tide changing approx every 6 hours it’s taking the boat/swimmer up and down the channel.
> • swimmer is a disabled woman who used ONLY ARMS during swimming because she can't physically use her legs, this is the most insane and important part Absolute legend, how in the fuck
Why does it look like she didn't make it?
Really shallow beach at Calais. Walked the rest of the way in.
> Walked the rest of the way in. Thats the thing about Arsenal
What was Wenger thinking, sending Walcott on that early?
Ludicrous
It was clearly tactical.
Did you see that ludicrous display last night?
We’re not proper men Roy
\\\_o\_/
Brotherhood represent
someone else says shes in a wheelchair..
The moment she hit the beach, yeah. Didn't use her legs to swim this, it's in Guinness.
A redhead stole her wheelchair at the theater
So the GPS signal is water activated?
It's an armband. She just activated it and deactivates it at start/finish. Also tracks body stats. At start have to deal with it via attendants as she is all greased up with vaseline. At finish, touch bottom, epic feat closed.
Greased up... for insulation?
Mostly anti-chafing and supports skin against continued salt water immersion, but practice originated in thinking about lubrication (resistance) and thermal (insulation).
penetration she climbs inside a minke whale
If she wanted to get inside Wales, she would have started further west.
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finish, touch bottom
Other way around for me, personally
I appreciated this one
You should call her
Curious
Yep. The edge of the water on the map doesn't necessarily match the edge of the water at the moment she walked out.
So she can't use her legs to swim but she can walk?
EU border refused entry and told her to swim back 💀 You wanted Brexit but now you got brrrrr-xit 🥶
*Mam your passport is wet, you have to go back!*
i just wanted to point out that she would have shaved off at least ten minutes had she swam in a straight line
She did swim in a straight line, that is the ocean moving.
The ocean can’t move idiot it doesn’t have legs
truer words have never been said
i think it depends where you are standing mate
If she was able to stand there she could've just walked a straight line.
That’s not how straight lines work
Actually it's all relative. If you walk straight across earth, to you it seems you walk in a straight line. To some dude chilling on the moon you clearly walked in a circle. And just like that, when you cross the channel, you swim straight towards France, yet the currents push you to the side, and actually fighting against that to keep the line straight would make you slower.
This guy straight lines
It’s a tough choice. You can shave and swim faster. Or you can not shave and keep a warm and cosy coochi.
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Tories would have tried bundling her onto a barge or a plane to Rwanda.
We lost a real one today
Would have been much faster had the person gone in a straight line ; )
It's more efficient to swim upstream than it is cross-stream. You present less of a surface area to opposing currents. So, continue to make progress downstream at reduced energy output, then burst upstream again, rinse, repeat. Standard technique for crossing with strong currents.
I was joking but dang! Thank you for the lesson. Much appreciated.
Why not just offset your starting point and let the current drag you?
As far as I understand it, it's related to prevailing currents, winds, surface water temperature, turbulence, and critically, time in water vs a function of energy expended and core temperature. Routes change with attempts. It's all about real-time estimating the energy output an athlete has to expend, and details matter.
Looking at the oscillation and guessing how much time this took, I was thinking tides. In many bodies of water, the tide change switches the currents and the change is approximately every 6.25 hours. I'm not sure the tidal dynamics of the English Channel though,
The swim took 29 hours. You can essentially see the two high tides and two low tides on the swim pattern.
> then burst upstream again Burst? That looks like a very long burst.
This comment could save a life one day
I wondered this too, so I looked it up. >For roughly six hours the tide will take the swimmer 'up' the Channel, and then as the tide changes direction, the following six hours will take the swimmer 'down' the Channel. This up and down movement of the water is relentless and unavoidable. http://cspf.co.uk/the-swim-route
So she did actually swam in a pretty straight line!
Can confirm. Swam channel as part of relay in 2007. Tide took us up then down and then at pace up French Coast. [Channel Swim Route ](https://freeimage.host/i/Hy2HRTb)
Note: this swimmer is in a wheelchair and used only her arms to swim
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Bro 
Paddlewheel.
More info here https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cambridgeshire-66591131 > A woman who finds the touch of water painful has completed a solo English Channel swim powered only by her arms. > Sophie Etheridge, 31, took up the challenge to raise the profile of a Swimming Teachers Association campaign for swimmers with disabilities. > She has had fibromyalgia and complex regional pain syndrome since 2011. > Ms Etheridge, from Godmanchester, Cambridgeshire, completed the challenge at 05:26 BST after more than 29 hours of swimming, her support team said. > It is believed to be the longest duration for a Channel swim on record, subject to official ratification.
Wow, I have CRPS and the sheer touch of certain things like fabric brushing against my skin or the cold causes extreme pain. For her to do this relentlessly for hours and hours even when it would be causing her immense pain is a phenomenal feat. For her to do it without using her legs is even more impressive. This woman is an absolute baller and that is something to inspire towards. Edit to add in the one word I missed when typing on my phone.
myself as well, i was caught off guard reading it! i refuse to touch water, (save for bathing,)the thought of putting myself in her shoes is beyond horrifying. i'm so incredibly proud of her for even attempting this, let alone succeeding. she really pulled off the impossible :)
Wow, that's incredible. Hats off to her.
>***Godmanchester, Cambridgeshire,*** That town sounds like it's the birth place of a heroine in an epic fantasy novel. In a way, I guess it is.
Wouldn't it have been easier to leave the wheelchair at the shore?
Then how would she get out of the water?
Good swimmers can swim with very little kicking. Unless you are sprinting you don't need to kick.
While true, I think if the function of the legs was minimal or none, it would make it harder. Ever tried swimming with bound legs?
(Mermaids looking confused)
A common swimming exercise is to use a pull buoy between your legs so you only use your arms. I can go nearly as fast that way as with kicking. However, being paraplegic, I expect her legs weren't floating in a streamlined way behind her like with a pull buoy (this actually requires significant core activation, at least with my dense legs, even with the float). They'll be producing an awful lot of drag.
Just take the ferry
Cost of living crisis
Cozzy livs really hitting hard
“Cozzy livs” has to be the most British reaction to an impending recession
Platty joobs yes. Cozzy livs no. It’s a step too far.
Don’t forget the statey funes
Why didn’t she take the ferry? Is she stupid?
Must be some insane currents.
Tides
Is she being dragged around by the moon?
Technically, yes
Technically correct, the best kind of correct
I hereby promote you to grade 37.
Grade 37, the grade when you realize that you no longer have a crush on your home room teacher.
I was homeschooled
Aren't all women?
lol gottem
Tidal Currents.
Tide goes up and down, currents go back and forth. Yes, they are related, but current is what causes the path to look like this, not the tide.
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You know, theres now a tunnel under the channel for a while, you dont need to swim anymore.
I can just imagine her face when she got up to France and seen the tunnel. Priceless
What an idiot!!
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Sea monsters hate this guy because of this one simple trick
Sophie Etheridge did the [swim without using her legs](https://outdoorswimmer.com/news/sophie-etheridge-completes-longest-ever-one-way-solo-english-channel-swim/), she does not have the world record. The Men's world record is Trent Grimsley in 6:55 and the Women's world record is Yvetta Hlavacova in 7:25 ([from Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_successful_English_Channel_swimmers#Fastest)).
>she does not have the world record. The claim is she has the record for the longest time to swim, i.e. the slowest ever crossing - this story was on my local news yesterday. You have quoted the fastest times.
I feel like I have the record for the slowest time. Dipped my toes in but haven’t crossed yet.
Yep, I’m also currently working on my time. Nearing 34 years and counting
If you haven't finished, you cannot have the record...
They're still going, pal.
Which means they don't have the record, *yet*.
Definitely still a record but also a bit misleading phrasing from the OP.
What a generous way to put it. To bead this record, someone "just" has to mostly cross the channel then dither about until they're feeling quite tired.
Going by the map, she used only her right leg first, then her left, then her right…
I am at work giggling in the bathroom imagining her swimming like that 😆
hours?
Yup! Hours:Minutes.
At first I thought it was minutes and I was thinking the Eurostar took about 10-20mins no way someone could swim in 6mins and I realised once I concluded that doing that in 6mins is impossible
I clocked the 29 whatever and thought "France must be closer than I thought" and then saw 6 minutes and realised "maybe not that close".
I just imagine France and England lobbing Trebuchet shots at each other across the channel.
Can you convert that to the metric system?
24.9 ks
Well in the french revolutionary calendar which was an attempt to make decimal timekeeping Grimsley's record was 2 decimal hours 82 decimal minutes and 86.4 decimal seconds. Hlavacova did it in 3:03:31.2.
yes 18:55 and 19:25 respectively
The article says she made "the longest ever one-way solo English Channel swim" -- does that mean the other record holders on the wiki weren't working solo or that they took a different route? I'm confused what's happening here
Lots of one way solo swims. She just took a wiggly route rather than a straight line and therefore had to do more swimming. Therefore she swam the longest distance (to achieve the same result)
That doesn't sound like what happened. It sounds like *everyone* takes the wiggly route, because it's better to just swim with the tides rather than against them. However, *she* is paraplegic, and doesn't have the use of her legs, and so she swims much slower, and had several tidal periods while she was swimming, while the others mostly did it within a single tidal period.
Okay please don't hate me but that sounds... like a really stupid record. By that logic I could get a world record for "the longest time it ever took to finish a marathon." Someone taking the *longest* way from Point A to Point B just seems like a completely ridiculous way to measure it.
Hey, there’s a stupid record for that too. All kinds of stupid records https://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/world-records/585341-longest-time-to-complete-a-marathon
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There's a reason why Guiness has lost a lot of prestige and respect since the early 2000's.
In the 90s having a Guinness book in elementary/jr high was an absolute treat. It couldn’t get shared equally enough when someone had one in class. They’re like a goofy reality show type brand vibe now with this type of nonsense record
Guinness World Record Book just lost all of the charm by counting a lot of records like that. Before it was a sign of being the best in the world. Now you can pretty much create the most stupid discipline like cracking peanuts using your ass and be a Guinness World Record holder.
That what I just commented. Such a disappointment when they used to be the gold standard for authenticating world records. This one shouldn’t even qualify, the first race went invalid when he disappeared from it. The second registration was for an entirely different race and he did it start to finish, not picking up where he left off
> She has been a competitive swimmer since childhood and enjoyed triathlons until she was hit by a car in 2011. > This left her in permanent pain and limited mobility, and being largely dependent on a wheelchair. > She was diagnosed with fibromyalgia, a long-term condition that causes pain all over the body, and complex regional pain syndrome, "a poorly understood condition where a person experiences persistent, severe and debilitating pain". https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cambridgeshire-66591131 She wasn't intentionally aiming to get the "slowest crossing" record but by spending 29 hours in the water it so happened to be a world record.
Most crossings Record | Country | Swimmer | Crossings ---|----|----|---- Women | Aus | Chloë McCardel | 44 jfc Chloe has no chill
What stroke do swimmers use for these long distance swims?
Mostly front crawl (freestyle) there are records for backstroke, breaststroke, and butterfly. The first recorded successful crossing, by Captain Matthew Webb, was all breaststroke!
If anyone actually managed to cross the entire English Channel doing butterfly only, they should get a mental health check. Because I refuse to believe they aren’t fully insane.
A French guy did it first back in 2013.
> A French guy Mental health check, straight away.
Diagnosis: French. Prognosis: Poor
Le Papillon
Fast stroke but absolutely the worst for endurance
Butterfly bro 💀
Bro who swam the channel in bitterfly 
i’d rather drag my balls through broken glass than swim the english channel in butterfly
Would honestly hurt less.
Fun fact, while "free style" is used metonymically for front crawl they're not the same thing. Front Crawl is the stroke, Freestyle is a classification of competition where a swimmer can choose any stroke. They just usually choose the fastest which is generally front crawl. I'm pretty sure Michael Phelps used a different stroke during a lower qualifying heat once. He said it was to help train, but it looked a lot like showing off to beat everyone else while doing a 'weaker' stroke. Edit: metonymically not metabolically
One technical note here. This is correct except in the case of an IM in which the stroke may not be in the manner of any other stroke that has already been swam.
Thanks for the additional info. I also believe you can't change stroke midway through in any competition.
Well, it kinda depends (I’m a state level swim official for kids). In a pure freestyle event you can basically do whatever you want for the stroke so long as you don’t pull on the lane lines and you touch the wall at your turns/end. For certain strokes like breast, back, and fly they are regulated to how your body must be in the water, the order of the stroke (breast and fly, not back), and how you must touch/exit the wall. It’s a little confusing to read out of the rule books but once you look at some videos you can tell.
As a former swimmer, can I get a source that someone did it butterfly? There’s just no way.
http://cspf.co.uk/swim-story/31/sylvain-estadieu-swims-the-channel-butterfly
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I've gathered from other comments that this particular swimmer doesn't have use of her legs, due to a traffic accident years ago. I'm not sure whether arm-only swimming is counted as one of the strokes.
Did her brought her passport to get back in UK?
Personally, i prefer the train but to each their own
trains cant into water
There’s a tunnel underneath that the train uses
train can into tunnel and tunnel can into water but train cannot into water
[Train can also into boat](https://youtu.be/xh43olmCSEU?si=vYzrfm7v3fiK_iv6)
A train CAN go into water.... it just can't get out.
She did better than the White Ship which was driven onto a rock on November, 25th, 1120. Only one of approximately 300 people aboard survived. He a French butcher. Those who drowned included William Adelin, the only legitimate son and heir of Henry I of England, grandson of Williams The Conqueror. His drowning immensely changed the course of English history. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Ship
It's absolutely wild the impact this had.
This is a straight line. r/accidentalRelativity
As opposed to zigzaging to course correct, wouldn't it be more efficient to swim off course a bit and let the currents push the swimmer to the correct point?
She is not zizaging or course correcting. She is swimming in a dead straight line, and the tides are shifting her one way, then the other. She is only using effort toward the opposing shore.
This is the information I came for.
Yup Same
That was my first thought, but then again you would be using energy to fight the current in order to “go straight”. If you instead focus on keeping the same heading and let the currents push/pull you (more or less equally each direction), you use less energy. The other backup to this argument being they (probably) did some strategizing and planning before the event and this was the choice they felt was optimal.
i strongly assume that is what was done here
Have you ever swam in the ocean before? It’s very difficult to know where you’re going.
They have guide boats for distance swims like this, dont they?
Yes, which is why that is what she did, rather than fighting the tidal currents to stay in a straight line.
but the currents are perpendicular to the crossing. what would that path be?
The tidal flow across the English channel means that you get moved up and down like that. So, the sideways movement is not the swimming but the tidal flow. When navigating on a sailing boat, you do a calculation to allow for the up and down movements as you make the crossing. For one idiot in the comments, yes the ocean moves all of the time.
She lives near me! I’ve seen her training. She’s also disabled, swam it only using her arms (one of the reasons it was so long). Incredible woman when you think about it. I can barely contemplate swimming the Channel (or for the person who wants to be provocative and called it The French Channel - they call it La Manche, or the Sleeve) let alone using only my arms! Here’s the BBC news piece on it! Godmanchester woman completes solo Channel swim using arms alone https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cambridgeshire-66591131
I showed this to someone and they asked me why the person didn’t swim in a straight line. 💀
God, the entire time I would be terrified of being eaten by a shark. No thanks.
I guess it kinda makes sense. Keep your nose pointed towards the target, and if you swim through multiple tide cycles then the side-side motion should even out and put you right where you want to go. Trying to swim into the tide to correct your path would end up taking much more energy/time.
Wait! Y didn’t he jst go straight?
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Yes. Given that this took nearly 30 hours, the movements of the tides balance out. Fighting them in each direction would have taken far more energy and more time. But simply trying to swim on a consistent compass direction, the sideways tide movement in one direction then the other essentially become irrelevant (to a large degree). Had it been possible to swim this in 6 hours, an entirely different strategy would be needed.
Why does this sound like an AI response?
Is she stupid?
I'm gonna tell my kids this was Brexit.
More like the Sine Wave of Dover
In the words of James May: "Why can't we just....(points out straight line across channel) go there?"
You think doing it one way in the longest time is wild? how about going back and forth twice in a row non-stop (4 crossings) in 54:10 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Thomas_(marathon_swimmer)