'Wild' Outdoor Swimming Is New Fitness Craze

8:19am UK, Sunday September 04, 2011
Gerard Tubb, North of England correspondent

Swimming in rivers and lakes is the latest craze for people who want to exercise without joining a health club.

A screengrab from Gerard Tubb's VT shows people diving into open water for a swim
Wild swimming groups say their membership is booming, despite the UK weather

So-called wild swimming groups say their membership is booming despite the UK's unreliable weather and chilly open water.
Comedian David Walliams is being given some of the credit for the increased popularity of the sport - after swimming the channel for charity five years ago.
He is about to swim the length of the Thames for Sport Relief.
Swimming outdoors became unfashionable after the Second World War - all but killed off by cheap travel and a burgeoning health and safety culture.

The water's clean, you're with the ducks, and unlike in a pool it's not just boring swimming up and down.
Training advisor Pauline Squire
Its revival is being helped by social networking sites that make it easy to arrange meetings and promote suitable stretches of water around the country.
Former training advisor Pauline Squire, who organises swims in Ellerton Lake in North Yorkshire, has seen attendance double in six months.
"We get 20 people or more in the water each time, including young children," she said.
"The water's clean, you're with the ducks, and unlike in a pool it's not just boring swimming up and down."
Meanwhile, Daniel Start, the author of a guide book to wild swimming, says he has had more than a million hits in since it was launched three years ago.
The Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents has changed its advice to would-be wild swimmers in recent years.
Instead of telling them not to do it, the current advice from Peter Cornall, the society's head of leisure safety, is to take advice and be careful.

Three girls are swimming in open water in a screengrab from Gerard Tubb's VT
People keen on wild swimming are advised to go with an organised group
"Try and find an organised group, so you go with some people who can explain to you what the hazards are and the things you need to look out for," he said.
"Rather than just stripping off and jumping straight in, stop and think before you take the plunge."
As Walliams prepares for his gruelling swim along the Thames he said the sport's dangers are not to be underestimated.
"There's a lot of traffic in the Thames, I've been hit by oars, I've been attacked by a swan - it's really not a good environment for swimming," he warned.