COLDNESS OF WATER

Press, Volume CI, Issue 29718, 11 January 1962, Page 13

COLDNESS OF WATER

Swim “Close To Impossible” (N.Z. Press Association) WELLINGTON, Jan. 10. "Nothing is impossible, but this swim is pretty close,” said a well-known Wellington swimmer of former years. Mr C. E. Claridge, today. He was referring to Miss Margaret Sweeney’s unsuccessful attempt to swim Cook Strait. "Miss Sweeney is a very game girl, but she should have trained in colder water. Once you get below 60 degrees it is cold water,” said Mr Claridge. The biggest handicap to any swimmer trying to get across the strait was the powerful rips. It did not make much difference from which side a swimmer started as the swimmer would strike a rip at the end of the journey when he or she was most tired. Before the last war Mr Claridge himself had been asked to try the swim. “I looked up the tides, temperatures and other things and would not have it on,” he said. During the season water in the English Channel was warmer by a few degrees than that in Cook Strait. Anyone attempting the local swim should got acclimatised. He had heard of long distance swimmers getting seasick but, although he had swum in all sorts of conditions. it had not happened to him.

“Yes. she’s a very game girl, but swimming Taupo is a different thing to this,” said Mr Claridge.