By CASEY NEILL
PAUL Hoffman swam from England to France last week.
His 14 hour and 45 minute journey across the English Channel started at sunset on 26 July but had been decades in the making.
The Rhodesian-born father of two had been dreaming about the challenge since he was 14 years old.
Open water swimmer Lewis Pugh assessed Mr Hoffman’s qualifying swim for a surf lifeguard position at Sunrise Beach in Cape Town, South Africa, and told him about his tilt at the channel.
Mr Hoffman decided his 40th birthday would be a great time to tackle it, contacted coach John van Wisse and trained in pools and open water across Melbourne.
Noble Park Aquatic Centre and Dandenong Oasis played a key role in his preparations.
His support crew dragged him from the water eight hours into his first attempt at the swim, in July 2012, following four hours of vomiting.
“The day I swam, as it turned out, was the two-year anniversary of the day I got pulled out,” he said.
“That was a bit of a mental hurdle.
“Starting off – nervous would be an understatement.
“Once I was in the water I settled quite quickly.
“It was good to knock it over.”
He hadn’t expected to take on the swim so early but couldn’t refuse an open weather window.
“I had six hours’ notice of the swim window,” he said.
“The weather in the channel is pretty unpredictable. Most of the following week was blown out.
“I spoke to my support crew and told them I was still feeling jetlagged.
“They told me to swim on Melbourne time.”
Mr Hoffman set off from Dover at 7.30pm and emerged from the water in France at 9am the following day.
“I swam into quite a few jellyfish so I had quite a few stings in the early part,” he said.
“You just break it up into building blocks mentally.
“I told myself ‘the next block is going to be sun-up’. By sun-up I was 10 hours into the swim.
“I had a fantastic support crew who really took care of me.
“I got quite sick about three hours into the swim. I got a feeling of deja vu.
“They just took care of it.”
The crew kept his wife Wendy updated throughout the journey and she, in turn, kept the social media world abreast of his progress.
“I was just blown away by the support,” Mr Hoffman said.
“They were ecstatic.
“My son stood up at school and said ‘my dad swam to England’.”
The water was 17 degrees – balmy compared to the 10 degrees Mr Hoffman had been training in back home.
He was only allowed to wear goggles, a cap, and speedos and wasn’t allowed to touch his support boat.
Crew members threw out containers attached to a rope filled with food and drinks.
The route across the channel is 34 kilometres in a straight line but Mr Hoffman ended up swimming more than 60km.
“The current is quite strong and it flows up and down the channel,” he said.
“I really got dragged around quite a bit.
“You’re not aware of it when you’re swimming. Because you’ve got no reference point you can’t really see.”
After walking onto the shore, Mr Hoffman had to turn around and swim back to his support boat for the three-hour journey back to England.
“After the swim I was quite sick on the boat, and I was quite sick that night,” he said.
“I woke up about 3am, stiff as anything, and got up and swam.
“I couldn’t swim much at all. My body just would not stretch out.
“The day after that I swam a bit further.
“It was nice not to have to swim, but just swim because you want to.”
Swimming for fun is now his focus and he’ll support two swimmers in training to tackle the channel next year.
Mr Hoffman used the swim to fund-raise for StarBright – a learning exchange program supporting AIDS and HIV-affected orphans in Cape Town’s slums and shanty towns.
Visit www.paulschannelswim.com or www.starbright.org.au to make a donation.
