The Channel Swimming and Piloting Federation (CS&PF) have launched a new website at www.cspf.co.uk. The content-rich site has been designed to interest and support all swimmers whose dream is to swim across the English Channel.
The CS&PF is a governing body for English Channel Swimming and is the largest organisation for English Channel swimming. In 2011, the CS&PF successfully piloted 44 swimmers to their goal of swimming the English Channel. The CS&PF is recognised and approved by many world class sporting and marine organisations including the British Maritime and Coastguard Agency (MCA) and the French coastguard (Centre Règional Opèrational de Surveillance et de Sauvetage (CROSS) Gris Nez.
The site has a wealth of practical information including an informative explanation of what English Channel rules are. It also features personal accounts of swimmers who have successfully swam solo between England and France. The CS&PF site contains facts about every aspect of the swim from making the decision to swim, to what to do after you've achieved your English Channel goal.
To date, 1,245 swimmers have made a total of 1,691 solo crossings of the English Channel since Captain Matthew Webb's first success in August 1875. There have been six fatal crossing attempts since 1875. More people have climbed Mount Everest than have swam the English Channel, and the site has been developed to cater for swimmers who wish to do battle with an arguably liquid parallel of Everest. The site has been designed for future expansion by including options for swimmers to add video diaries, photos and written accounts of their swims.
Nick Adams, CS&PF President and a seven times successful swimmer of the English Channel says that the site is special because it gives people a better window into the sport of open water swimming, enabling them to see what we they are really all about. As for describing the effort of swimming the English Channel, Adams quoted Capt Webb's wise words of 1875, with the reminder that "nothing great is easy".
