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

Heartfelt Thankyous for everyone that's helped us along the way PART II!

44 days to go. After a frenzy of sign up activity yesterday its calmed down a little which gives me time to continue with my story of the event so far and the huge thank yous that are very much due to some very key people.

Certainly plenty of activity going on though all the same - last night I spoke with our 1070 District Chair about a Peterborough Rotary Global Swimarathon event, and I'm very pleased to share that there are no fewer than 4 separate Rotary clubs there combining together to take part in the event - and none of them are on the official registration radar just yet . Coupled with new interest from Rotaract clubs in Romania, and news of 2 more clubs in District 9550 - Susanne Rea , Ida Portella, Marcel McLeod - you are doing a wonderful job in spreading the word!!, looks like we are more than on track for reaching 50 clubs entered by the end of this week.

As I said though today's post is about sharing some more of this fantastic journey into unchartered Global Rotary territory and acknowledging the amazing contributions of so many people who've helped us along the way.

Back in October, Roger Graves was given a prime speakers slot at our District 1070 conference, just prior to the main speaker the one and only Anne Widdecombe. He did an amazing job in pitching the event, and coupled with stunning video footage provided by Gordon Seabrook who unbelievably does all of our Swimarathon footage at no charge, we soon had a powerful message to share with clubs all around the world.

Here in the UK, there was a lot of RIBI social media activity around the #WorldPolioDay campaign, through working on that, we became in regular contact with District 1140 Governor Mukesh Malotra. His constant campaigning on our behalf and for the End Polio Now campaign made a huge difference in terms of attracting followers and attention. Despite a serious illness set back towards the end of the year from which I'm very pleased to say he is gradually recovering , he is still incredibly supportive to us.

During that twittering #rotaryendpolio campaign, I really enjoyed working with Sarah Bosomworth - another fairly new Rotarian from the Rotary Club of Knaresborough. I was really impressed by her efforts to get our message out there, and she very quickly took on the challenge of pitching the Global Swimarathon to her club. She completely refused to let any setbacks stand in the way and get an event set up and her determination made me have no hesitation in commiting to join her in taking part in the June 2012 Great North open water swim for End Polio Now.

On twitter, we had attempted to get in touch with various swimmers in our search for a UK ambassador. We were extremely delighted to be followed back by Fran Williamson, a recently retired Paralympic and 5 time world champion swimmer. But what really struck us on reading her blog info http://www.fran-williamson.co.uk/ was how committed she was to supporting charities -including support for local Cambridge charities and her role as ambassador for @whizzkidz a brilliant national charity to help kids with mobility issues. Fran was very supportive of our initial enquiry and put us in touch with her agent (and partner) Chris Whitaker. Right from the first conversation with Chris I knew we'd found our ambassador. Both of them were really passionate about what they do, about supporting charities and making a difference. Its been such a pleasure working with them ever since I can't tell you. We met them both in person up at the Disabilty Sports Events England National Swimming short course championships up in Sheffield in November and they were just the nicest, most down-to-earth people you could ever meet.

We had another special trip to Sheffield back in early November. Our Swimarathon Chairman - and I'll get to the thanks for him in another separate blog - he truly deserves it - was nominated for Fundraiser of the year by the National ASA governing body of swimming , and we were guests at the Swimtastic awards 2011.

What an incredible day we had I'll never forget it. Along with all the other award nominees , ordinary every day swimmers of all ages from the length and breadth of the land , we spent an afternoon "swimming with the stars" - including the whole team GB waterpolo ladies olympic squad, Divers, synchronized swimmers , Junior , Olympic and Paralympic swimmers. As a life-long sports fan I was completely star struck - but what was most striking was just how friendly and approachable everyone was. Naturally we brought the Global Swimarathon tshirts along for signatures, but what was great was just how interested everyone was in the event. The Team GB Waterpolo ladies, including ex Grantham player Vickie Bowen, Angie Winstanley Smith and many others all said they'd be up for taking part even though they were likely to be in Australia. We also met Claire Cashmore, a Leeds based swimmer and friend of Fran Williamson, who said her Dad was in Rotary and she'd love to help - she certainly did that - she's now special guest at the Knaresborough event - told you Sarah was good at organizing it!!

Roger actually won the special achievement award in recognition of 22 years raising £500,000 for local causes - just wonderful. Here's the moment captured on my dodgy camera video, introduced by swimming legend Steve Parry http://youtu.be/02t9hjqXqgY

To be continued in Part III coming soon!

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

An Incredible Global community of swimmers united to End Polio Now!

46 days to go.

Another milestone reached, as we can announce our 40th full registered club taking part in the event.
The Rotary Club of Mawddach in District 1180 Wales, became our first entry from Wales, and our 17th overall in Great Britain and Ireland - many thanks to Rotarian Beryl Clark for registering your club.

We're reaching ever more countries as well - just today Ellen Yu from the Rotaract club of Shanghai, China confirmed that their club had voted to take part - so very much look forward to them joining the list.

Sometimes, rather than words, a simple picture will suffice. Here's a first draft map capturing all of the clubs signed up to date around the world - just wonderful to see it all here

View Rotary Global Swimarathon participants map

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!