Join us today in a candid and fun discussion as we chat with Andy Donaldson, the world record holder for the Cook Strait Swim and a great ambassador for the sport who's on his way to becoming the first and fastest swimmer to complete all Oceans Seven swims within 12 months. The podcast was filmed live and can be viewed here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=taR7J3TJTM8&t=1315s To contribute/help with Andy's noble endeavours to raise awareness of mental health issues via swimming, please visit: https://www.teamblackdog.org.au/fundraisers/oceansseven Enjoy ..read more

Last week – when I flooded everyone’s inbox with news that Swim Smooth was back (sorry, not sorry – as the kids say!), a gentleman from Oregon in the USA reached out to who informed me he’d just turned 89 years old the week before and that swimming was what was keeping him going in later life. He described his life in three parts: 1. His youth was the first third, he said, when he was very successful in both the pool and open water. This time included the dream of most all athletes, to be a member of the US Olympic team. He swam the 1500 in the Melbourne Games in 1956. 2. The second third woul ..read more

We've got a cracker of a podcast for you this week - a fireside chat with Rob Hutchings, author of The Downriver Nomad, as he tells his story about dealing with the adversity of an alcoholic parent, the heartache of trying to adopt a child, and how he's found solace in his open water swimming pursuits and his own triathlon adventures, including swimming the length of the Clutha River in New Zealand, a distance of 256km! Rob has some profoundly deep messages in this podcast about discovering within yourself what swimming is all about to you, about how to find challenges without necessarily hav ..read more

Today we're joined by Ross Davenport - 3-time Olympian, 2-time Commonwealth Games gold medallist, former European record holder and now FINIS international business development manager. We talk about Ross's childhood as a wannabe soccer star, his break at 12yrs old from swimming and the pivotal moment that saw him return to the pool fully committed and ready for action. Interestingly enough, former podcast superstars Rebecca Adlington and David Davies have also have similar hiatus periods in their adolescent years only to return more fired up than ever. Ross's interview is a great one to liste ..read more

In today's podcast, we speak with Jess Potter, our online video analysis competition winner from a couple of weeks ago. The conversation with Jess - a respiratory specialist from London, UK who's been fighting on the front-line over the pandemic - was so engaging that we thought you might benefit from her story in podcast form, if you wish to see the video analysis, please pop over to this YouTube link. The video analysis commences at ~20 minutes into the clip. In it, we discuss the following: how Jess's hand entry has led to some shoulder injury woes and how to fix them how Jess's pull-thr ..read more

What a cracker of an episode Paul Newsome and co-host Lucy Gibson have in store for you today with special guest, Rebecca Adlington - double Olympic gold medallist and former world record holder in the 800m freestyle event with an incredible 8:14.10. Becky has recently got married and had her second child, Albie, so we are incredibly grateful to have spent an hour in her company discussing her story and rise to dominance in the swimming world. As well as her amazing career, the podcast covers life after swimming, her great relationship with coach Bill Furniss and a 20 question Pub Quiz challen ..read more

Today we speak with a super inspirational athlete and coach, Swim Smooth Coach Paolo Mangilinan, who's based in Dubai, UAE. As part of the annual Dubai Fitness Challenge - which seeks to encourage people to partake in 30 minutes of exercise every day for 30 days - Paolo decided to take it upon himself to swim 10km in the open water around the world famous and tallest building in the world, the Burj Khalifa, every day for 30 days in November! Yes, that's significantly more distance than many of you might cycle or run in a month, and Paolo is swimming it, unaided, without a wetsuit, flippers, pu ..read more

We're back and pumped today with the achievements of Swim Smooth Manchester's Head Coach, Lucy Lloyd-Roach and her team of four female swimmers who on the 1st September broke the world record to be the first ever female English Channel Relay Team to swim across La Manche in full medley order - backstroke, breaststroke, butterfly and freestyle - with each team member having to complete 60 minutes of uninterrupted swimming on their given stroke. Lucy swam the butterfly leg as British Master's butterfly champion, with Melanie Holland (a Triple Crown marathon swimmer and 4-way English Channel rela ..read more

Today we're joined on the podcast by 5-time Ironman World Champion, Craig ("Crowie") Alexander. Crowie was the 2008, 2009, 2011 Ironman Triathlon World Champion and previous course record holder (8:03:56 in 2011), and the 2006 (inaugural) and 2011 70.3 World Champion. In 2011 he won both the 70.3 and the full Ironman World Championships. Needless to say - he's a beast, but best of all, he's an absolute gentleman too! Craig was humbled when Ironman legend and six-time World Champion Dave Scott lauded him as “the first true men’s champion the sport has seen in years.” The most important thi ..read more

Well, we did it! This one's been about 3 or 4 weeks in the making! True to the worldwide collaborative efforts we're currently seeing around the globe with corporations coming together in a siege-like mentality and utilising technologies like Zoom and Slack to build a stronger team, so too have we compiled our resources to bring you something very special today. At Swim Smooth, we've spent the last 10 years creating an amazing team of specialist coaches around the world who've become certified in our methodology to the extent that they run their own Swim Smooth Squads and training programs in ..read more