Hundreds join UK's biggest mass swim
More than1650 swimmers, from the West Country and beyond, will filter into the South Hams for the country’s most famous open water swimming event, the Dart10k this weekend.
Bringing 2.6 spectators each on average with them, the event is expecting to bring 7000 bed nights and a spend of over £1 million into the area over the one weekend.
“It’s all about figures at this stage,” says Kate Rew, founder of the Outdoor Swimming Society and the Dart10k event.
“250 metres of bunting, 40 tubs of flapjacks, 10 mermaid waymarkers, scores of professionally trained paddleboarders, 14 degree water, and swim times of up to 6 hours (for the 10 mile swimmers). What we can’t wait for is for the event to begin and it to become all about being in the water and swimming!
“People are nervous but excited. 10k is an aquatic marathon – people will have been training all summer if not for a number of years to get here. The water temperature has dropped a few degrees in the last week, and we are swimming on a neap tide this year which means the current is less, so there’s a lot of trepidation amongst swimmers about how it will go. But with a warm and balmy weekend ahead, and a fabulous welcome, it's getting exciting.”
Spectators are welcomed at the swim start at Totnes, and the 10 mile finish.
Swimmers depart from Longmarsh Green in Totnes at 11.45am on Saturday 5th September and 12.45 on Sunday 6th September.
“It’s quite a sight,” says Rew, “like a migrating flock.” Most swimmers wear wetsuits but there are also some skin swimmers, and a few swimmers doing the swim using butterfly.
This is the sixth year of the event which began in 2010 with 200 swimmers, and the first time that the event has run over two days.
The first mass 10k in the country, this year it boasts the first 10 mile swim in the country, with 40 swimmers attempting the distance down to Warfleet Creek in Dartmouth.
“Please come and welcome them in,” says Rew, “counteract the loneliness of being a long distance swimmer with a well deserved cheer.”
The 10 milers are expected at Warfleet Creek between 4.30pm and 6pm on Saturday afternoon – parking is at Dartmouth only.
The swim raises money for the Outdoor Swimming Society, a not for profit organisation which informs and inspires wild swimming and runs a free map of where to swim: wildswim.com - and three charities, the Devon Air Ambulance, Frank Water and the Marine Conservation Society.
For more information please visit www.outdoorswimmingsociety.com
