This week's guest is Helen and as we approach week... 7? 8? of lock down in the UK, it could not have come at a better time. Helen is a powerhouse of joy and fun. She shares all that positive energy in this interview, and like swimming outdoors, I felt better afterwards than I did at the start. What a gift. Despite having a broken ankle, Helen greeted me on our Skype call in full swimming gear - costume, hat, goggles and tow float, plus Polar Bear buff and medal. When we can't...

This week's guest is Tina, and we spoke 3 weeks into coronavirus lockdown in the UK when we were both still trying to process what was happening. It is a quiet, reflective conversation, through which we learned how uplifting it was, actually, to talk about our winter swimming season just gone, even though wild swimming is inaccessible to us at the moment. Things we talk about Polar Bear Challenge, intermittent fasting, Parliament Hill Lido - fish event, Portishead popsicle event, ice...

This week's podcast was recorded back in January when the world felt like a totally different place than it does now. Juliet had just swum at a pond where she broke the ice for the first time. We talk about her work as a textile artist where she does free motion machine embroidery inspired by wild swimming and the nature that surrounds her. You can find Juliet on all her social media and see examples of her work here Things we talk about Sharrah Pool, Transylvania Food Company,

Welcome to this special episode of the Swim Wild podcast with all of the Outdoor Swimmer magazine team. I am joined by Simon Griffiths, publisher, Jonathan Cowie, editor, Joanne Jones, sales executive, Luke Chamberlain, editorial assistant and Ella Foote, contributing editor for a chat about wild swimming in the world of coronavirus lock down. If you don't already subscribe to the magazine, please consider becoming a subscriber. I know many people have lost their income due to the...

This week's guest on the Swim Wild podcast is Becca. She talks about how she got into wild swimming after a car accident, and why she is now on the brink of her first ice mile. She is a glorious soul who will lift your day. Things we talk about IWSA winter swimming world championships, Alice Goodridge - Scottish winter swimming Championships, Caroline Saxon, Team GB, Barbara Hernandez, Chile ice mile, South West Seals, Clevedon Marine Lake, Cath Pendleton, Swim Your Swim, Fenwick...

Welcome to the Swim Wild podcast. This week's guest is Sara. This was recorded back in January 2020 when we were all still out swimming, and had heard of coronavirus but were not overly concerned. It is a joyful chat from a time when we probably felt we had far less to worry about, although we were blissfully unaware of what was to come. Sara is hopefully is wonderful antidote to self isolation. If you want to hear more from her you can follow her on Instagram...

Welcome to episode 50 of the Swim Wild podacst! What a milestone. It is very exciting that this coincides with the launch of my new logo - which was only bloomin' designed by Megan! Megan is the Artist behind Flotsam Prints, which many of you will be familiar with. If not, get over to her website and check it out now. I've absolutely adored her work since I first saw it, and so was delighted when she agreed to design me a bespoke logo for the podcast. I could not be happier...

This week's guest is John, Based on his experience of outdoor swimming, he ended up spending a significant amount of time, developing, testing, refining and launching a new safety product, called Tekrapod.   It is really interesting listening to how he took the issues he was having with existing devices and applied his own experience, knowledge and passion to creating something different that worked in a specific environment.  

  This week's guest is Francesca. I selected her interview to go live on International Women's Day especially.       I really wanted to share what she had to say about the way the wild swimming community on social media feels like such a safe space.   And how an ill-judged comment, about bodies, can jeopardise that.   She has first hand experience of that. So also chose to challenge it, despite knowing that this might result in other people, hiding behind...

This week I am talking to Genii who lives in Upstate New York. I'm fascinated that she came to wild swimming as a bi product of teaching SUP Yoga - taking lessons when she was in her 60s, as she's never learned to swim properly. This was about added security for her SUP Yoga clients, but what she found was a whole community of open water swimmers and a series of events that she was actually quite good at. She may think that she has won medals because she is "lucky" that there aren't...

Welcome to Season 3 of the Swim Wild podcast. Apologies for the extended break. This week's guest is Janne from the Telemark region of Norway.     The lake she swims in most often is Tinnsjå. Things she mentions that you might like to look up BBC documentary about reducing the need for medication through wild swimming, Ella Foote - a dip a day in December, Parliament Hill Lido, Leap In, Turning and Taking the Plunge books

This is the 3rd 'best bits' episode pulling together some of the best clips from the 40 or so interviews I've done so far. Sorry there are no photos or links this week - my boiler is leaking and the insurance firm can't get the right person here to fix it between Christmas and New Year. Brrr. But on a positive note, I now do have a cast iron roll top bath in the back garden for cold water acclimatisation!

Another 'best bits' episode this week, featuring these fabulous guests (click on their photo for their individual episode) Sarah Jane Beverley Suzanna Vicky Sylvia Gilly    

This week we are looking back at 2019 and some of my favourite bits from some of the interviews I've done. This week I have chosen Sylvia Laycock of Pacific Open Water Swim Co, Beth French and Dee Newell. I hope you enjoy it.

If most of your social media is wild swimming connected, chances are you already follow this week's podcast guest, James 'Jumpy' Kirby. James chronicles his swims, both photographically and in terms of key data. When I bumped into him back in February 2019 at Millerground in Cumbria after a swim, I recognised him instantly from Facebook! It was such a joy to finally meet up with him properly in October 2019, to swim together at Colwith Force and then to record a podcast with him. He...

This week's guest has done 6 ice miles so far and is planning another 4 this winter. She might as well, she says. Get to a nice round figure while she works out where this might be taking her. My conversation with her got me thinking about the ideas that we connect with. We can't always articulate what it is about them that appeals to us. Why something within them innately resonates and makes sense to us. But what brings us joy, also brings us into new communities, where we find people,...

This week's podcast guest is Dr Tara Shine. She is an environmental scientist tackling climate change both on an international stage, and in her local community. If you have ever felt overwhelmed by the enormity of the climate crisis, and wondered what impact you, as an individual could possibly have on it, this episode is for you. Our conversation focuses on how we can all live more lightly on the planet. This includes what we can do about plastic pollution, how we can live more...

This week I am returning to do a second interview with a guest I spoke to back in June 2019 - Dean. In his previous episode, he shared with me his experience of swimming the length of the Wilamette river, and how, somewhat inexplicably, this helped his recovery from cancer. After an hour of chatting he tried to move on to tell me about how he then went on to swim the length of the river Shannon, but I stopped him, as it felt like a whole new chapter. I wanted to give that second...

This week's podcast guest is Dee, and she swam the English Channel on 4th August 2019. Of everyone I have heard speak about their Channel swim, Dee is by far the most positive and optimistic. She had a great swim. Loved it. Smashed the time goal she set for herself. Got out and did a yoga pose on the beach in tribute to a yoga-teaching friend who had been so supportive. It is an almost unbelievably positive story. But wrapped up in Dee's Channel swimming story is a sense of fate -...

My guest on the podcast this week, Gilly, was someone I had never met before. Yet I felt so familiar with some of the swims she had done earlier this year, due to the amazing photographs her friend, James Kirby, took of her and submitted to Outdoor Swimmer magazine. I looked at the snowy landscape and frozen lakes with envy and admiration, and knew that I wanted to speak to her to understand what that had felt like. Gilly had been doing an alternative version of the R.E.D. challenge -...

My guest this week is Emma, who describes her wild swim journey as walking towards her fears. A few days on from the North East Skinny Dip, I'm still thinking about fear. 737 people completed the skinny dip. Running naked into the North Sea at sunrise. I was one of them. Reflecting back on what we achieved, the challenge will be different for all of us. For many people the cold will have been their biggest fear. For others, the size and strength of the waves on the day. For others, it...

This week’s podcast guest is a genuine inspiration. As a child burns survivor, she has very visible scars on her back. She has encountered a lot of ignorance in other people around this. People who think it is ok to video her without her permission. To educate their kids publicly about burns in her earshot without involving her in the conversation. Telling her she should not be uncovered in public. Being aware of these judgements, it is no wonder that she began to assume that anyone she saw...

This week’s podcast guest has got a wildly different relationship with wild swimming than me. While this was a challenge for me as an interviewer, I think it is great. The wild/open/outdoor swimming community is large. And diverse. And that’s a good thing. Instead of debating what the differences might be between wild swimming, open water swimming and outdoor swimming, I’m far more interested in what the similarities are. Whether the cold isn’t your thing but measuring the distance and...

This week's podcast guest, Jax, is a very experienced sea swimmer. She doesn't describe herself as a distance swimmer, although she lets slip "I did swim 10 miles once"! But having that experience means that she can be an explorer. Which may involve a long swim. She just doesn't especially measure it. Instead, she takes a trip. Rounding headlands, just going that bit further to see what lies beyond. She describes being in the sea as being at home. She delights in the immersion, which is...

This week’s podcast guests are Stacey and Max Holloway of WayOutside Limited in Oban, Scotland. I went from being slightly anxious about how a three way interview over Skype would go, to feeling very comfortable with their complimentary conversational style. They were both very in tune with each other as both people and swimmers, and the confluence of their individual swim stories into a coherent narrative about their business was very easy to navigate. It felt like a real yin yang...