We've finally arrived in Swimarathon Month!

24 days to go. Woke up this morning to discover an email from the multimedia news editor of Rotary International asking for a photograph from previous Swimarathons as they will be writing a feature over at http://www.rotary.org as part of the build up to the Rotary anniversary day celebrations!

Simply Wonderful!!

Following on from yesterday's blog feature on the number of swimmers expected to take part and the fundraising targets, inspired by a post from my good friend Susanne Rea I want to highlight again the opportunity for all of you now taking part in Global Swimarathon to get other clubs in your district involved - either to supply extra swimmers / fundraising support, or even to stage separate events.

Susanne laid down the challenge out there to other Districts around the world to see which District will have the most representatives outside of the UK.

So in that spirit of "competition" - here's a current "league table" showing which Districts have the most registered clubs taking part

1. District 1070 England 12 Entries
 (Rotary Grantham's home district) As you might expect (given we're swimming at a very reasonable time of day and we've had a lot of local publicity ) - we're still leading the way with 12.
2. District 9950 Australia 7 Entries
Well Susanne - just one PHENOMENAL effort - swimming between 21:30 and 23:00 to have 7 clubs represented is just astounding - hats off to you all!!
3. District 3272 Pakistan / Afghanistan - 4 Entries
Just remarkable to have such a strong representation across the age groups of clubs in a region where Polio is still endemic
4. Joint 4th - District 9940 New Zealand - 3 clubs
1AM in the morning - say no more!!
Joint 4th - District 9320 South Africa - 3 clubs
Believe their may be even more in the region so hope they will sign up too!
Joint 4th District 7040 - Canada / USA - 3 clubs
Joint 4th District 2450 - Egypt - 3 clubs
Wonderful to have 3 clubs in Cairo joining us
5. Joint 5th - 2 clubs in D3170 India, 1010 UK, 5340 USA, 2980 India, 2241 Romania, 1110 UK, and 1280 UK


Here's the full list of clubs fhttp://www.rotaryglobalswimarathon.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=2&Itemid=119


So there you have it - still time to get your club more entries - REMEMBER PLEASE REGISTER EVERY CLUB taking part in joint events - ONLY 1 ENTRY NEEDED FOR WORLD RECORD, but EVERY INDIVIDUAL CLUB needs to be in THE EVENT LIST

Together we can achieve that magical 100 clubs figure -

Please tell us all about your event plans!

32 days to go. We've reached a wonderful stage now where new entries and new interest are coming in from all corners of the globe, in a constant stream of updates. Just yesterday afternoon after I'd finished my blog entry, our 56th club registered came in via Brett Culpin of the Rotary Club of Melton Aurora in our home District 1070, the 3rd entry in the space of a few hours.

In the next few hours we'll send out our 5 weeks to go news email to all the participating clubs and attached to it will be a spreadsheet outlining the local details of each event. For all of you reading this who are entered, we'd love to get an update on the following:

Location of event: Name and address of pool / open water venue
Local Time of WR swim : Just to check we all have the right time agreed
Number of Swimmers expected : So that we can track where we are in terms of the World Record numbers
Event Duration : -Many events will include additional activities spanning a few hours
Fundraising target : An estimate of how much you are aiming to raise (in local currency is fine)
Other event information : Do you have any special guests, extra swimming events, other fundraisers on the day/night eg food, raffles, street collections.

As soon as we get the information we will of course share it on our world wide map of entrants  - here's what we have so far on the map http://g.co/maps/fzbzw

Finally just want to give a huge shoutout and say a massive thankyou to all the girls in the Team GB Olympic Water Polo Team. As we've mentioned here before, we met them all up at the Swimtastic awards in November, and have followed their progress ever since. Even though because of training requirements they won't be able to take part on the day of 25th February, they've very generously offered to donate our club tshirts, signed photos and even a cuddly bear mascot for us to include in our special End Polio Now auction we are planning. They are also definitely up for taking part in the future. All I can say is , it makes me immensely proud to be able to consider myself a supporter of these brilliant Olympians. For me they represent everything that's right about sport. They are improving day by day, taking on the best in Europe and the World, utterly dedicated to their goal of Olympic achievement. Just as we Rotarians are so determined , so incredibly committed to seeing the End of Polio. It's just magical when we can bring these two worlds together. Please join us in supporting these fantastic ambassadors for their sport on twitter at http://www.twitter.com/GB_WPolo_girls  Thanks!!

Rotary Global Swimarathon - bringing the world together!!

40 days to go. A few days ago I wrote about an extraordinary coincidence , where Janet Mills who'd left Grantham 11 years ago, discovered from her Rotarian Travel Agent Ida Portella in Mareeba , Queensland that Mareeba would be joining in the Global Swimarathon. So wonderful to have a representative of our town , who's attended our local swimarathon events all those 1000s of miles away on the day.

Well my friends, it seems that the laws of chance have smiled on us once again!
Just speaking with Barry Phillips of the New Generations committee in our club today, and one of the original organizers of our very first event back in 1990. He was saying that unfortunately he's away on holiday on the day of the Global Swimarathon.

Turns out he'll be in Kenya, and more specifically it turns out he'll be in Nairobi, Kenya on the 25th February 2012

Well now, a few weeks back, thanks to the efforts of David Hastie, the Rotary Club of Nairobi officially registered for the event!

So, not only do we have Grantham represented Australia, we now have the opportunity for one of our very own club members to join in whilst all the way over in Kenya (assuming he remembers to pack bathing trunks!!)

Just shows how truly global the event has become - really, anything is possible

In the coming weeks and days, let's work together to get many more clubs signed up, and let us show the world just how remarkable the Rotary family really is.....

Guinness World Record here we come!

41 days to go. Can't tell you how fantastic it is to hear about all the different local events being planned around the world for Global Swimarathon. Have been doing some quick calculations around how many swimmers we can expect for the record attempt. As I've said before, we're inviting 500 swimmers to our Grantham Meres event. Elsewhere in the UK we've already had a figure of 240 swimmers for the 4 Peterborough clubs and 200 swimmers expected at the Knaresborough event. Add that to a figure of 60 given from the Rotary Club of Sawantwadi last night, just before they celebrated charter night on the very day India was declared Polio free for a full year, and there's 1000 swimmers already.

Now over in District 9550 Australia, the Rotary Club of Townsville , led by President Marcel McCleod are really leading the way. Not only have they brought us legendary open water swimmer marathon superstar Penny Palfrey, they have managed to book up just about every pool in the town. Get this - they are planning to have 1000 swimmers taking part!!

So there you go - 2000 swimmers in just 5 clubs. With Melton Mowbray Rotary confirmation earlier today we already have 47 clubs officially entered. The current record stands at 2533. With an average entry expected of 100 per club I genuinely believe we could be looking at between 10 and 20 thousand swimmers  - what an incredible message of unity and determination to End Polio Now!!

It's no longer a question of CAN WE BREAK THE RECORD? its simply a question of BY HOW MUCH!!

With 3 weeks to go to our own Rotary Grantham Swimarathon weekend, last night I headed down for a swimming session. I've set myself a personal goal of raising £2012 , swimming 201.2 lengths over the weekend, doing the 100 metres in Global Swimarathon and finally the Great North Swim Open Water event in Lake Windermere , Cumbria in June. http://www.justgiving.com/PaulWilsonRotary

There I was, last session of the day, in that 25 metre, 8 lane pool, swimming on my own. The thought of this quiet , empty  pool, about to be transformed into centre stage for so many thousands of people , raising so many thousands , maybe even hundreds of thousands for such an incredible cause -just takes the breath away

LETS GO FOR IT!!!

50 confirmed clubs a terrific milestone!

42 days to go. Here we are then , just over 6 weeks until we all line up together to swim for End Polio Now.

To demonstrate the true potential for widespread club participation, in the space of around 2 hours yesterday afternoon UK time, we had no less than 4 separate sign ups and one other attempted registration!

First we were joined by the Rotary Club of Ramsey , District 1280, located on the Isle of Man here in the UK, thanks to Peter Whiteway. Swiftly followed by 2 sign ups from Rotary Clubs in Peterborough District 1070. As I mentioned in my blog entry a couple of days ago, in actual fact there are 4 separate Rotary Clubs combining to stage the event, all being co-ordinated by our District Communications chair Graham Walker. Great to see Rotary Club of Deepings listed as a club entry and Rotary Club of Peterborough Werrington listed in the World Record attempt.

Next came an entry from further afield - a most welcome 4th sign up from the United States from Robert Hanna of the Rotary Club of Lake Placid - now there's a famous name from Olympic history!!

Adding in other clubs around the world that we know are definitely taking part but for whatever reason have not yet completed registration and we have well and truly achieved the 50 club markGlobal Entrants Map latest

As I mentioned, we were contacted by Chris Watts from the Rotary Club of Brackley about an issue he had during sign up. 

The error in question is something that has come up before so it's probably worth me explaining the cause and resolution here once again to avoid others having the same issue.

Basically if you go straight to the website, and look at the links on the left side of the front page - you will see a link "Enter your club " under event so the temptation is to go straight to that link. If you look closely at the error message details on screen, you will see the cause - you need to be logged on

For website security reasons, only users who have created an account and logged on to the website will be able to enter their details. 

If you look at the "Start here" section at the top of the page, it has step by step easy to follow instructions listed out for you.

In summary 

1. Go to Member Login - select create a user - enter user name and password and email

2. Check email - click on the link in email , then log in with user name and password you created

3. Go to "The Event" select "enter your club" and fill in the details

4. Go to "Guinness World Record - click on "enter your club for the record" and fill in the details

Steps 1 -4 should take no more than 5 minutes to complete , and that official registration completion, means that we are notified via email automatically and can send you the event information pack.

Any problems encountered, any time of day or night - please drop us a note to rotaryglobalswimarathon@gmail.com or contact us on the facebook page at http://www.facebook.com/rotaryglobalswimarathon and we'll be happy to help you sort it out

Connections everywhere in the big old Rotary family!

43 days to go .  Absolutely delighted to see that our daily updates are starting to pick up significant page views -thanks so much for all of you who continue to share on Facebook and Retweet - it really does make a huge difference.

Proud to announce we have just received our 44th official entry, from the Rotary Club of Ramsey in the Isle of Man District 1280. Great to see the Isle of Man represented - our club President Peter Berry 2011/12  (of the Rotary Club of Grantham) will be especially delighted as he was born there!! Many thanks to Peter Whiteway for completing the registration.

Another absolutely  brilliant story from today is the news that the Toronto Earls Court Rotary club have confirmed they will be taking part, all set to be the second confirmed entry from Canada. What's particularly great about this , is that a few weeks ago I was contacted by Past District Governor of  D6330 in Canada Tanya Wolff who said that she very much wanted to take part in our event but would be in Toronto on that day. To try and identify a club in the area, I put out a request on our twitter feed. After a little while and some Retweets, Gordon Crann , chair of the  Rotary District 7070 World Community Service Committee in Toronto got in touch with us via twitter asking if he could help. I sent him the details and immediately he sent out to all of his contacts in the area. 

Then just this morning I got the confirmation that he'd found a club ready to take part. I sent out a note to let Tanya know, and he put us both in email touch with President Pauline Nuttall and Doralice Ferreira of the club. 

What an amazing example of Service above self and of Rotarians such as Gordon prepared to go the extra mile and a half to connect us all together . Just like this whole wonderful journey so far, it is so magical to experience all this Fellowship on a truly international scale. Proud to be a Rotarian - 100% YES!

Here's the latest map with today's additions http://g.co/maps/eur46

Incredibly proud to share this message from our RI President

45 days to go. What an amazing day all round!

This morning opened my Inbox to see that we had received a special message from Rotary International President Kalyan Banerjee - naturally it now has pride of place on the quotes section of our website

http://www.rotaryglobalswimarathon.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=81&Itemid=138

Thanks to the support of Jack Selway, CEO and founder of the inspiring worldwide Rotary Global History Fellowship and his executive board members Prakash Sarasawat and Nevine Abdelkhalek, we had 3 more club sign ups today in fairly rapid succession.

The first of which  appropriately enough was from a club in District 3170 India, especially symbolic given that  India has just  achieved a full year Polio free. A second sign up in District 3170 followed shortly afterwards, and then a brand new country represented as Nevine Abdelkhalek of the Rotary Club of El Tahrir in Egypt.

I also received encouraging confirmation from Ellen Yu of the Rotaract club of Shanghai that they are definitely taking part.

To cap it all, this afternoon, I had a great chat via Skype with Chad Waldo, from the Rotary club of Lee Sunrise in D6040 USA, who has set up a fantastic Podcast service to broadcast project news to clubs around the world . Check it out for yourself at http://itsrotary . Hopefully our conversation about Global Swimarathon will be ready and shareable on podcast by Sunday 15th January - will be sure to keep you informed. Reaching an audience of 500-600 Rotarians each week, I'd encourage anyone with a project idea or event you want to publicize to talk to Chad - you can even connect with him on twitter at http://www.twitter.com/itsrotary When I asked him about it yesterday he got in touch straight away and despite a few network gremlins at my end, remained patient and extremely helpful 

One final bit of good news is that RIBI have just released the 2nd nationwide press release about Global Swimarathon , so should be even more sign ups to come on a local RIBI level!

Only 7 more clubs to go till the next milestone of 50 - well on course to achieve that by the end of this week - the global map is looking more and more exciting by the day!! 

http://g.co/maps/edq5h

It's a small world after all!

47 Days to go. 


A fantastic illustration today of how far Global Swimarathon has got in terms of spreading around the world. Today I received this message on our Rotary Club of Grantham facebook page

Janet Mills

I left Grantham 11 years ago to live in Australia and recently moved to Mareeba in Far North Queensland. I`m not in Rotary but have been following the Swimarathon on facebook. I was so thrilled when I found that Mareeba are entering. I am very proud to tell anyone who will listen that I am from Grantham and remember and have supported the early swimarathons. Well done Grantham. I will be at the pool here on the day not swimming but supporting. 

Turns out that Janet was in a travel agent in Mareeba booking a trip back to Grantham, and the lady dealing with her (Ida Portella is it you?) was talking about Rotary and the subject of Swimarathon came up and how Mareeba were going to be joining in - amazing to think that someone from our town all those thousands of miles away will be able to "represent" Grantham at their event - just puts a huge smile on my face!!

It may be a big old world, but it really has been  made a lot smaller through the support and fellowship of the worldwide Rotary family!

Heartfelt thankyou's for everyone that's helped us along the way - Part 1

48 Days to go. Today I just wanted to take a few moments to reflect and acknowledge the remarkable support of some key people in the Rotary and sporting communities that have transformed swimarathon from a local project with a dream into a wonderful worldwide charity event.

Back in April 2011, when we first set out to make contacts with the wider Rotary world, we set up a facebook presence and gradually started getting the message out there. We had some great help via Rotarian Simone Carat Collins chair of the recently founded Rotary on Social Networking Fellowship and all the members, which really helped us get established and build up some supporters.

Next big breakthrough was when Rotarian Noelene Jorgensen of Port Elizabeth Rotary in District 9320 South Africa, picked up news of her event - and wow did she run with it. As a keen swimmer herself , with lots of local contacts in the swimming community, she immediately went out and got a pool secured, and then set about spreading the word throughout her district. She even invited us to attend her District conference to speak about the event which unfortunately we were unable to attend. Her support has resulted in at least 4 South African clubs signing up to date , including 3 in her District.

Meanwhile over in Australia, Rotarian Susanne Rea, fundraising officer for The Rotary Foundation (TRF) in District 9550 Queensland , continued to spread the word about our project at every possible District opportunity, which resulted in an extraordinary breakthrough. Marcel McLeod President of Townsville Rotary, had been talking with legendary Open water marathon swimmer and distance world record holder Penny Palfrey (based in Townsville) about a swimming event for End Polio Now, and when Marcel and Penny heard about our project from Susanne, rather than seeing it as a conflicting project, they immediately embraced it and suggested that Penny could even be our first Global event ambassador. It was absolutely overwhelming for us back in the UK, to have such an international swimming star backing our event.

We've had so much amazing support from them both, Marcel has done a huge amount of work publicizing and producing the materials to support the event as effectively the International branch of our swimarathon committee, Penny has consistently taken time out of her amazingly busy schedule to record video messages, and brought us a huge new dimension of open water swimmers in Ireland, the US and all around the world lining up alongside us and working with local Rotary clubs. Susanne has just been unbelievable , continually championing our cause with the remarkable result of 5 District 9550 clubs signed up including her own, even though she can't be there on the day - I had the pleasure of meeting her in person during her recent London visit, just brilliant to see the friendships and fellowships formed from working on this event.

In August, during a visit to our club and District by RIBI President Ray Burman, we were delighted by his extremely positive reaction and support when we pitched our global swimarathon plans to him. Ever since he has continued to support us via his facebook page, and even highlighted our event first in his quarterly video message over the summer. He helped us secure the support of RIBI nationwide PR for Global Swimarathon and ever since we've been in touch with the fantastic head of PR Rebecca Warner it's made a huge difference with 3 nationwide press releases in December, Jan and Feb. To top it all during his District tour of District 1030 at end of February, he will be a the  Rotary Club of Knaresborough event as their special guest

While writing this, it's dawned on me that I can't possibly cover all the all in one post - so as they say in all the best stories - to be continued!!

One thing is for sure , particularly for me as a novice Rotarian, in my first ever year , the family of Rotary, the worldwide fellowship, the heart and dedication of its members to service above self is almost beyond words, and beyond measurement. It will stay with me all my life - of that I am sure!

First Irish club registered / event news and updates

53 Days to go....

Just had confirmation thanks to the brilliant efforts of Irish Open Water legend Donal Buckley - check out his fantastic website at http://loneswimmer.com/ that the Rotary Club of Waterford D1063, Ireland have just become the 36th Club officially registered and the 11th country now represented - Here's the full list of entries http://www.rotaryglobalswimarathon.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=74&Itemid=124

As well as those already fully signed up we continue to get multiple new enquiries on a daily basis from Rotary Clubs across the Globe so we're hoping the list of entries will rapidly expand to 100 or more by the end of this month!

Just take a look at some of the quotes and feedback we've had on the website

‎#Rotaryglobalswim - Just published a great selection of messages on what people are saying about the event around the world! http://www.rotaryglobalswimarathon.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=81&Itemid=138

Here in the UK RIBI (Rotary in Great Britain and Ireland) are now centrally promoting the event to every club in the Country

 Sign up and dive in to save millions of children from polio:http://www.ribi.org/news/articles/rotary-global-swimarathon-makes-a-splash-worldwide

Rotary Global Swimarathon makes a splash worldwide - RIBI

www.ribi.org

We've even been featured in Rotary Down Under magazine - have a look on page 35

features a full page article (P35) on Penny Palfrey's incredible @EndpollioNow challenge and her support for Global Swimarathon http://flipflashpages.uniflip.com/2/26587/49598/pub/ - 50,000 readers - very exciting!!

Rotary Down Under

flipflashpages.uniflip.com

Please please keep on spreading the word - talk to your club and get signed up if you can - be part of something amazing!!

Happy New Year - The countdown truly begins!!

First of all, let me wish each and every one of you a fantastic and unforgettably magical 2012. Here in the UK there's an unmistakeable extra level of excitement and wonder now that the Olympics and Paralympic Games are just around the corner.

As promised, today marks the first day of daily blog updates letting you know all the latest Rotary Global Swimarathon developments. Over the next 55 days we will be sharing all the latest entrant details and event plans with you, including where and how you can take part ,whichever continent of the world you happen to reside in!

No better place to start than our incredible and utterly inspiring Swimarathon ambassadors. We are truly blessed and completely overwhelmed to have two true swimming legends working with us.

Firstly want to say an enormous thankyou to all the Rotarians and friends out there who got behind and voted for our Australian ambassador World record holding ultra marathon swimmer Penny Palfrey to be World Open Swimmer Woman of the Year.

It was a remarkable response all round but one that she completely deserved for her amazing performances including the unforgettable Bridging the Cayman Islands Swim. In the end, she amassed over 18% of the votes and 1887 in total, finally just being edged out by the current double world marathon champion Pilar Geijo from Argentina. 
http://www.palfreymarathonswims.com/2012/01/wowsa-results-for-2011/

I'm very sure in 2012 with all the phenomenal challenges she has planned she will go one better. Whatever the case, we will continue to give her our absolute support. Her involvement and support has made such an amazing difference to our event going global, meaning many $1000s and potentially 100s of $1000s will be raised for Rotary International's End Polio Now Campaign

Our UK ambassador 6 time Paralympic medallist and 5 time world champion Fran Williamson continues to be utterly committed to our event and we are extremely honoured to have her attending our Grantham event in February as special guest. She's even coming out of retirement to take part . Here's her very special message she recorded for us

All in all it's set to be an incredible event for such a very important cause -We want as many people as possible to share in it, so please keep spreading the word.

Contact us any time on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/rotaryglobalswimarathon or twitter at http://www.twitter.com/rotaryglobeswim or most importantly to register to take part please go to http://www.rotaryglobalswimarathon.org/

More tommorow!!