
Leaping for the joy of swimming
Ella Foote meets Alexandra Heminsley, author of Leap In, an emotional account of her venture to tackle the sea, from learning to swim properly to swimming from island to island in Greece
Running taught me
you get to choose to have a level of self-determination about the person you want to be, swimming taught me that you can be this far into your life and decide you would quite like to learn to do it well” says author and journalist Alexandra Heminsley who has recently mastered outdoor swimming.
If you have read Alex’s new book,
Leap In, the first thing you will notice
about her in person is that she is now
close to the arrival of her first child – the
book ends with her questioning if she
would ever have children. The second
thing you will notice is her passion
and persistence to constantly challenge
herself. Leap In follows the success of
Running Like a Girl, a book that tells
her story of starting to run and making
it part of her life. “If you are like me,
trying to do something different, there
is always a question mark whether
you will actually do it – part of
the experience is to question
it, especially with swimming,”
says Alex.
Alex and I met on Brighton
beach, where her swimming
story begins. It is a beautiful
day considering storm Doris
had blown through the day
before. The sea is calm, with
gentle waves hitting the pebble
beach. The sun creates a shimmering
path on the water and creates an
inviting spell over me. The beach is busy
considering it is a weekday afternoon,
children play at the water’s edge and
surfers lurk besides the steel skeleton
that once was Brighton’s West Pier.
The sun is warm enough for Alex and
I to be sat outside on the sea front, the
splashing sounds beyond us a constant
reminder of what brings us together
today.
Leap In chronicles Alex’s venture to tackle the sea, from learning to swim
properly to learning to work with the
water to pull herself from island to
island in Greece. The story begins on
her wedding day and describes the
joy of leaping into water just in front
of her Brighton home she had lived
in for nearly five years. The opening
descriptions of being supported by the
salty sea, the tingle the chill brought
to her skin and sense of magic she felt
as she left the water are all feelings and
sensations many swimmers will relate
to. It was this magical feeling that got
her to back into the sea the day she
returned from honeymoon only to
discover how fickle the sea can be. She
describes how the water, colder than
before, steals her husband’s wedding
ring from his finger with the force of
one big wave. Although she has now
forgiven the sea, “It has given me so
much more than it ever took. Much, much more.” says Alex. “That day showed where my mind-set was, if I just threw myself at it and with a positive attitude, swimming
would just happen, like it did
with my running. But I soon learnt being a have-a-go-hero wasn’t quite enough, there was a massive readjustment to make mentally.”
Alex joined a local swimming course with the main goal to be able to swim Pier to Pier along the Brighton shoreline. She learnt with people who were also learning with a view to swim outside, a motivation aligned with hers. “Running had taught me – you get to decide, you get to say I want to be this kind of person, there is enough life for you to keep trying to do new things and you don’t have to have mastered it by a certain age,” says Alex. “I found it really satisfying learning a new skill in my late 30s.” The course was spread over the year and throughout the book Alex describes struggles all swimmers can relate to, which is part
of the beauty of the story. There were so
many times you could nod along with
the challenge you can face in water, no
matter how good a swimmer you are.
“Everything was pointless until I sorted
out my breathing,” says Alex. “You can
inefficiently drag yourself though the
water if you can get the breathing right.
You can have the most beautiful stroke
in the world, you can have your arm
in the perfect position and have the
body of Greek god, but if your heart
is hammering because you are not
breathing right it won’t mean anything.
It was worth learning to swim, even if
I never got back into the water, it was
worth learning that lesson – the self
reliance that you can master your own
breathing by deciding to.”

So much of what Alex learns
and experiences is anchored in her
experience of running. But she is quick
to remind us that just because you
are strong and fit, doesn’t mean you
can just pick up swimming – many
triathletes might agree. “My worst
marathon nightmares were either
about pain, which can heal or shame
– which will pass,” says Alex. “I would
negotiate myself mentally around those
two things, but with swimming my
nightmares were about dying! The loss
of control can be so fast, that is what I
learnt the day with the wedding ring – I
could feel a complete lack of control
with the environment I was in, which I
had never felt with running.” The book
appeals to so many different types of
people tapping into the minds of those
learning to swim, those embarking
on outdoor swimming events, body
acceptance, winter swimming, joy of
swimming and the collection of people
you meet through all different types of
swimming scenes.
Swimming events provide much
opportunity to swimmers to tackle
distance events across bodies of water
that otherwise they might not have the
opportunity to immerse themselves
into. “You can leave your house and
run 26 miles through a city at any point
you like, but swimming in some spots
you can only do with the support and
knowledge of experts,” says Alex. “But
swimming also has that wonderful sense
of adventure and the chance to meet the
characters who have been keeping lidos
open. They are the ones that kept
swimming as a viable thing while it wasn’t having its moment in
the sun.”
Much like with her book
about running, Alex is quick to
remind us of the mistakes we
often make when considering
sport. “It is the most consistent
and pernicious mistake that
sports marketing make – selling
sport to women is about how they
feel about their body and improving
it,” says Alex. “It is getting better, but
for men, advertising has scenes of men
involved in sport because it is time
with the lads, part of their social life,
while for women it is about getting
thin. What became even bigger with
swimming for me, because there was
so much happening to my body during
IVF treatment, is that it is easy to feel
disconnected or not in the club. If you
are not the swishy ponytail girl running
10k with pink knee-high socks, you
can’t do sport. But what we should be
focusing on is how sport helps you find
people who you can walk around the
park when you are at your lowest ebb.
They are the people that don’t just get
you around the park, but they get your
through some of the darkest times in
your year. That integration between the two is so important because if people
can see you can get that from exercise,
they would join in more.”
The community that has since
become Alex’s regular swimming
company have continued to be a
space for support and friendship. This
connection has helped Alex continue
to swim during the winter months and
even during pregnancy. On returning
to the water once she becomes a mother
Alex has ambitions for UK swimming
trips and expeditions, but also experiencing teaching her baby to
swim. “I am really fascinated how a baby can instinctively swim – the geekiness of that, how they learn to control their breath,” she says. She also has sights on learning to surf, wanting to disrupt the surfing clichés of what it means to be a surfer. “I want to be surfer/middle aged mother/having a go,” says Alex. “There is actually very little swimming and moving much more in a dynamic way. There is a lot of free
spirit tied to surfing, but I think any
relationship with the water and the sea
can be spiritual.”
Alex’s appetite for living doesn’t
stop with running, swimming or even
surfing. She is easily inspired and we
talked about climbing, poetry and other
watery writers. “I have a desire to go
off on a trip to surf, but that might just
be the bit in me terrified about being
a mother!” she says. Her infectious
sense of adventure will be what drives
her through the next challenge of
motherhood, I am sure. Her book
will resonate with so many about why
we swim and usefully ends with how.
Leaping into the sea at Brighton after
meeting Alex was even more enjoyable
knowing that is where it all began.
Photos: Chris Floyd

