Swimming and statues

I'm busy reading Lewis Pugh's book, 'Achieving the impossible' -  a birthday pressie. It's not a book I would have bought myself because Pugh's swims in icy water like the ones he has done in Antarctica, North Pole and more recently, on Mt Everest, have just not appealed to me.

That said, I am thoroughly enjoying his book. I'm about half-way through (currently in the year or 2003/2004) - he has just swum around North Cape in Norway. These exploits I find far more interesting that one kay swum in polar water. My friend's friend swims a kay or more every morning, every season, in the frigid Cape waters. Not minus 1C, but still damn cold. Definitely not for me. Brrrr...

One kilometre is classified as long distance, in swimming (seems to be; don't know if this is an official classification?). And it isn't really long distance, if you know what I mean. Half IronMan distance is a 1.9km swim; IronMan distance is a 3.8km swim. And then there are the Robben Island and English Channel swims, which really are long distance. Pugh has done both of these - and many other 'proper' long-distance swims.

I've never met Pugh but I get a really nice feeling about him from his book.

In the section of his book that I read last night, I really enjoyed the following. To quickly put it in context... it's New Year's eve in 2003 and Pugh is in New Zealand at a hotel near Mt Cook. He leaves a party and goes to find somewhere quieter. He finds himself at the statue of Sir Edmund Hillary. He lies down on the grass, next to the statue, looking up at the sky. He's thinking about what he wants to do with his life; he doesn't want to go back to being a maritime lawyer, despite the financial security. And he's also thinking of other adventurers, like Neil Armstrong. And then he says,

What differentiated them from others? The key, it seemed to me, was they took on the challenge that excited them. They weren't scared by their dreams. And for me, the thought that hit home that night was straightforward: you don't see statues of corporate lawyers.

Pugh chose to be, as he describes, "a pioneer swimmer; an explorer of water" with a defined goal to be the greatest pioneer swimmer in history. His aim is to cross seas and round capes that no one has dreamed of doing before and to swim in waters so cold that no one would think it possible to survive. So I may not get the cold thing but I get the rest.

Pugh certainly is a pioneer swimmer and I'm looking forward to reading the rest of his book.

By chance I saw this statue of a businessman (corporate lawyer? hahaha). No name. No head.
Probably lost it after hitting it against the wall too many times. I'd rather be the Hillary statue too.