Round the Rock swim for Action4Schools

Open water swimmer Mark Edmonds will today attempt to swim round the Rock in aid of the locally registered charity Action4Schools. He will be swimming approximately 12km and was scheduled to start early this morning at 7am from Western Beach. He will be swimming around the port area, Europa Point and the Eastern side and should be arriving at Eastern Beach at around 12 noon.

So far he has raised £800 for the charity.

“I have chosen Action4Schools because saw the important work they do within Sierra Leone providing school's with fresh water wells and providing schools with vital school equipment,” he told the Chronicle confident that he would complete his swim today in some four hours.

He spoke of the problems currently affecting Sierra Leone and the recent landslides where there was loss of life and devastation.

Mr Edmonds is serving in Gibraltar with the Royal Navy working at the DTC within the medical department.

He is new to open water swimming and took it up when he arrived here back in January joining the Bluefin open water swimming group which swims around Gibraltar at different locations.

“They have given me a lot of advice and welcomed me to swim with them.”

Training with them, he says, he feels confident that he can achieve his goal and feels ready for this first challenge.

“I have been focused on training for the last 10 weeks increasing my training times and ensuring I acclimatised for the time spent in the water.”

He hopes to raise £1000 for Action4Schools as this will aid the charity and hopefully make a big difference.

You can support his effort via the Just Giving page

Jimmy Bruzon who leads the Sierra Leone projects locally said Action4Schools was extremely grateful to the Mr Edmonds for taking on this challenge.