Eish!!: Freedom Swim 2007

Friday is a public holiday, Freedom Day, the day when we commemorate our first democratic elections in 1994 .
It's also the day 72 individuals and 5 relay teams are going to swim the 7.5 kilometers it takes to cross from Robben Island to Bloubergstrand. The event is a fund raising vehicle for the Vista Nova School for children with learning disabilities and cerebral palsy and this year the plan is to hand over R75 000.00 to the school. It's sponsored by Cadiz FSG who's CEO, Ram Barkai, is an ardent open water swimmer.
Being subject to the Cape Long Distance Swimming Association rules the swimmers are not permitted to wear a wetsuit. So it's a Speedo (just one) and a cap(just one) and googles. Considering the temperatures usually range between 11 & 14 degrees, these guys will get cold.(Eishman attempted it a few years ago when it first started but the freezing cold water got the better of him, so he knows what he is saying when is says "these guys get cold")

The swimmers will be leaving the island at 10am and the first swimmers should arrive at Bloubergstrand just over 2 hours later. It's amazing to watch the swimmers emerge one-by-one from the water. They will be all shapes, sizes, sexes and ages. Do yourself a favour, go and enjoy a day at the beach and support these athletes as they pit themselves against the elements, and a hungry fish or two, to raise funds for an extremely worthy cause.

Click here for more information.

[Update : You can track the progress of the swimmers realtime. Here's how as explained @ www.cadiz.co.za :

We have arranged for 6 units of GPS tracking devices to be placed on the boats of the top 5 swimmers and one extra Ginny pig.

How do I do that?

Login to www.sportstrack.net
Click on the login button at the top right corner of the home page
At the login screen – click on “Guest Login”
When entering the live site – you will see a menu of tacking devices on the left hand menu
You will see a map of Table bay and dots + names for each swimmer
The dots position will be refreshed every few second]

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Labels: eish, freedom day, sport, swimming