The last of the summer sun has well and truly faded but, at my local swim spot, there is a small but devoted community of people who still don their swimsuits and take the plunge into the freezing cold water every day.
So, why do they do it?
One man tells me that there are different types of winter swimmers – The Dippers and The Swimmers. He points at his wetsuit and goggles and informs me that he is a member of the latter. He says that swimming in the sea makes him feel “virtuous”.
According to him “the problems of the day don’t enter the water with you”. I can hear him laughing with his friend as they run the hundred metres to the water’s edge. Neither of them even flinches as they dive right under the waves.
Martin, a Dipper, comes every day before work for a quick sea water plunge. He jokes that he began swimming “out of Lockdown boredom”, but now it’s become a daily fix, “It’s Baltic in the Winter but it’s something I can’t do without. I need that adrenaline rush. It sets you up for the day”. When Martin gets out of the water he changes into a smart shirt, ready for a day of office Zoom calls.
Another woman, also a Dipper, tells me that she does it for the “clarity of mind that you get once you hit the water”. Submerged in the freezing waves, she says “you can’t think of anything else”.
When she gets out of the sea a few minutes later, she quickly wraps herself in layers of fuzzy clothes and cracks open a flask of tea with her friends…it is their after-swim tradition. They sit (two metres apart, of course) in the bathing hut, clutching hot-water bottles, shivering and laughing.
Lots of swimmers tell me that they do it because of the community it affords them. “Even if you go down and you speak to no one, you still leave feeling like you’re a part of something” one man explains.
An important aspect of the sea swimming community is its informality. Swimming takes place at public beaches. To get involved you need only show up at high tide and be willing to get very, very cold. It is an inclusive community.
There are people of all different body shapes, swimming abilities, and ages. I am shocked to see an older gentleman emerge from the waves with a walking stick in hand, but none the less he swims every day.
So, whether you start swimming for the mental health benefits or the sense of community it offers, I am assured that it is the best thing that these people have ever done. Their only regret – that they didn’t start sooner.