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I have been open water swimming for many years. My usual venues are lakes, sometimes rivers, occasionally the sea and whenever and wherever I capsize my boat.
For me open water swimming isn’t about getting from A to B; it’s about enjoying it. It’s about the exhilaration of the tingling chill of sparkling water, the tickling of pebbles underfoot, the pleasure of beautiful scenery around a mountain tarn, of being, and feeling, part of nature. There is no need to “suffer to succeed”. “Success” is enjoying doing it. It can all be done safely close to shore, quitting before suffering hypothermia or exhaustion, however much or little you have done. Just done for the sheer pleasure of it. Ten minutes in a lake on a warm, moonlit or starlit summer’s night is ecstasy. No wetsuit needed.
So many of your contributors seem proud of the fact that they have subjected themselves to such great pain or such great danger that I wonder about their mental health. It is their choice but are they masochists who need psychiatric help? I taught life-saving for the RLSS and could never condone the idiotic actions of some. Please don’t encourage others to copy.