Super Swim: Swimming the English Channel

On 4 July 2006, David Walliams successfully swam the English Channel to raise money for Sport Relief.

He successfully completed the swim in 10 hours and 34 minutes to cover the 35 km (22 miles) stretch of sea, the equivalent of 700 lengths of an Olympic standard swimming pool. This placed his effort within the top 50 recorded times for an unaided Channel crossing, in the process of which he raised over £1,000,000 in donations.

It took nine months of training to prepare for the swim. The training had to coincide with Walliams' and Lucas's Little Britain tour so every morning before performing he had to complete several hours of training before performing on stage in the evening, a schedule worthy of a professional sportsman. Walliams first swam from Portsmouth to the Isle Of Wight in around 2 hours and he also completed an eight hour swim off the coast of Croatia before embarking on the cross-channel attempt. Walliams has insisted that prior to his challenge he had never seriously taken part in any sport.

David sold his gear he used during his Super Swim on eBay and all money raised went straight to Sport Relief.

But why swim the Channel?

David Walliams likes swimming, always has. He spends an hour in the pool several times a week and enjoys the solitude of being in the water.

But he doesn’t like it that much – not enough to swim 20-odd miles across the cold tides of the world’s busiest shipping lane anyway. No, the reason he did this beast of a challenge is because he wants to raise boat loads of cash for Sport Relief.

In late July 2006, Walliams was considered one of two favourites to win the BBC Sports Personality of the Year award for this considerable physical achievement.

News Articles:

5th July 2006: From Little Britain to France

5th July 2006: Little Britain star swims the Channel

3rd July 2006: Grease covered TV David

Interesting Facts:

David Walliams successfully completed the 21-mile swim across the English Channel to France on Tuesday 4 July 2006 in 10.5 hours and raised £1,000,000 for Sport Relief.

He spent 10 months of exhausting training for the attempt with former Olympic modern pentathlete Greg Whyte.

During the crossing, he had to swim through shoals of jellyfish, and cope with water temperatures as low as 15C.

Whyte described swimming the channel as "one of the toughest physical challenges on the planet".

Fewer than 10% of people who have attempted to swim the Channel have succeeded.

The famous stretch of water is one of the world's busiest shipping lanes, with 600 tankers and 200 ferries crossing it every day.