PICTURES: Open water swimming club Scarborough Kingfishers retakes on two-way Loch Ness Swim after last attempt in 1983
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AN open water swimming club from England achieved a monster swim feat earlier this week.
A team of five swimmers, two crew members and two officials most of which from Scarborough's Kingfishers swimming club, completed a two-way relay of Loch Ness between Sunday and Tuesday with a final time of 26 hours, 48 minutes and 4 seconds.
It was a Scarborough swimmer named David Morgan to be the first to complete a solo double crossing of the loch, setting an unbeaten record-time of 23 hours 4 minutes at the age of 20.
Kingfishers' open water coach, Paula Ambury, said her team was aiming to break the record but were caught by surprise by a technical fault on Sunday.
She said: "At 5.30 that night our boat broke down, and we were meant to be starting by 8. I don't know how, someone must have been watching down from somewhere, but in 45 minutes we managed to find another boat and a pilot. So, the swim still went ahead.
The boat which broke was Stewart Griffiths’, wo re-joined the team after 12 hours on the new boat and skippered the last leg.
Ms Ambury said: "He was fantastic, went above and beyond to help us achieve our dream and I cannot recommend him highly enough for his piloting services."
The swimming team was formed by Georgia Amison, Maddy Adams, Bill Hitchcock, Jane Sedman and Scottish open water swimming champion, Colleen Blair MBE.
This attempt had been three years in the planning and was originally organised for 2019.
"The swimmers were amazing, said Ms Ambury. "It took us 15 hours to do the first way, because our pilot hadn't joined us yet. So the person on there was inexperienced and had never taken swimmers before, but bless him, he took us to the other end, and then when the real pilot joined us just before Lochend, then we came back in less than 12 hours.
"We would have smashed the record if the boat hadn't broken.
"However, it's not about the time, we really just wanted to do it.
"But we did it! But it was so dark - Loch Ness is so dark at night, I have never been anywhere as dark.
Her father, Ken Dickinson rode the boat which accompanied David Morgan back in 1983.
She said: "He rode the whole 48 miles, and I wanted to come back just to see how he did it, I have no idea how he rode it all those years ago!"
"This is the coldest water you can swim in, and the darkest. Even on the sunniest day, it would still be so dark underwater.
"It’s been a pleasure and a privilege to help bring this swim to its conclusion."
Maddy Adams (18), the youngest swimmer of the team, said: "It was an absolutely amazing experience and being able to finish it was even more special for me.
"This challenge was great to take my head off results day (18 August), which has been brilliant."
"It was quite weird, my shoulder was giving up and at a point I wasn't sure whether I would be able to finish it, but I did a little sprint and thankfully got to the end.
"I love swimming and it's taking me everywhere, and this is such a beautiful part of the world!"
