First Icelandic woman to swim the Channel

KarenT

Hi all,

Last night, the Icelandic National Broadcasting Service showed a documentary called "Shut Up and Swim" about Sigrún Þuriður Geirsdóttir's English Channel swim - the first Icelandic woman to complete it. You can find the documentary on You Tube here. You can click to get the English subtitles. Plus there's a quick snippet of me gabbing on about marathon swimming towards the beginning - my two minutes of Icelandic fame, taken from a video I made when my book came out!

But that aside, it's a lovely film - full of joy (and quite a lot of vomiting). It was a tough, long swim, and it's worth watching just for her celebration when she finishes. There's also some fabulous archive footage of marathon swims in Iceland.

KarenT

I just found out that earlier this month, Sigrún was awarded the Order of the Falcon for her achievement - the highest honour that the Icelandic state can bestow on an individual. Fabulous.

JSwim

I really enjoyed the movie, though it goes a bit slow to hold the attention of many non-marathon swimmers, I think.

It (inadvertently) highlights the benefit of tackling the EC as a seasoned long distance swimmer. SPOILER ALERT: She and her crew believe that she had the hardest crossing every. And definitely, at almost 23 hours, it was a truly amazing feat for someone who learned freestyle 3 years previously. But her conditions looked beautiful (if only I can be so lucky, if I attempt it), and barfing at feeds, even for 7 hours, is unpleasant and can become problematic, is not particularly unusual.

She showed her 6 hour qualifier at 10.5 C! But didn't say much about her training besides that she swam 3-5 days per week, and had done 2 EC relays, one swimming breaststroke. So maybe the qualifier was her longest swim? That would make her completion that much more impressive. Someone with the experience of many long tough swims under a variety of conditions, will know what to expect mentally and physically, and perhaps have strategies to deal with some of them. If I knew someone who had an EC crossing on their bucket list, but had no interest in marathon swimming otherwise, I would definitely have them watch this.

I'm thrilled that she was recognized with the Order of the Falcon!

miklcct

@JSwim said:
I really enjoyed the movie, though it goes a bit slow to hold the attention of many non-marathon swimmers, I think.

It (inadvertently) highlights the benefit of tackling the EC as a seasoned long distance swimmer. SPOILER ALERT: She and her crew believe that she had the hardest crossing every. And definitely, at almost 23 hours, it was a truly amazing feat for someone who learned freestyle 3 years previously. But her conditions looked beautiful (if only I can be so lucky, if I attempt it), and barfing at feeds, even for 7 hours, is unpleasant and can become problematic, is not particularly unusual.

She showed her 6 hour qualifier at 10.5 C! But didn't say much about her training besides that she swam 3-5 days per week, and had done 2 EC relays, one swimming breaststroke. So maybe the qualifier was her longest swim? That would make her completion that much more impressive. Someone with the experience of many long tough swims under a variety of conditions, will know what to expect mentally and physically, and perhaps have strategies to deal with some of them. If I knew someone who had an EC crossing on their bucket list, but had no interest in marathon swimming otherwise, I would definitely have them watch this.

I'm thrilled that she was recognized with the Order of the Falcon!

It looks that she is really tough. I admit that I won't be as tough as her. I will probably need to do a 30 km trial swim in my comfort zone first before I can go on to do the channel.

ColmBreathnach

It was a pretty good documentary. Not all channel swimmers have to be ex olympian, so it's good to see "ordinary" people completing it. However, she was coming to her limit, near the finish. I don't know that her own crew saying she only had 15 mins left was the right thing, but I assume she didn't hear that. I can only hear bubbles when I swim. Lots of stopping and arguing is a bad thing. It emphasises the need for experienced crew. Mike Ball, for me, was the main reason she finished. Shut up and swim. Sage advice. You don't talk your way across.