Swim Serpentine: Praise the Event, Not The Race
Updated: Nov 4
19 September 2026
I come to praise London Marathon Events, not to bury them.
In all my years of swimming open water races across the world (this includes a lot in the USA and Canada, but England as well as in southern Africa), I don't think I have ever attended a better organized, more energetic or more spectacular event.
This makes perfect sense, of course, as the event organizer's primary offerings are running races. In the decades I have spent going to watch my wife (and, occasionally, a daughter) compete in road races from 5KM up to marathon distances, I almost always stood around wondering, "Why can't swimming events have this same excitement?"
The only open water event I ever went to that came close was the long-running La Jolla Rough Water swim, now branded as the La Jolla Cove Swim. As great as that event was - and I went multiple years with one or more of my swimming daughters for an exceptional all ages family day of swimming in the cove - it still was low key compared to the Swim Serpetine event.
Beyond the electric atmosphere - with great music spun by a DJ interspersed with event announcements, a vendor village, food and coffee trucks, gobs of "hygiene" facilities and so much more - the clarity of the process and the day was operated as efficiently as the Swiss train system:
They had two massive tent systems setup - the dry station to change into your gear before the race and the wet tent area for after your swim, with a well-guarded and compartmentalized area for storing your clothes & stuff during your swim. From the time you exited the dry tent, they had nice mats laid down so our delicate, but shoeless feet didn't get spiked by rocks or whatnot; these ran all the way to the starting area.
The safety briefings were a mix of the normal course overview, process, etc. and some nuggets of open water racing advice from 2008 Beijing 10KM bronze medalist, Cassie Patten. And the course itself was well-marked with ample lifeguards and safety personnel on the one mile loop:
I really cannot say enough good things about the event itself.
As for the swim, as the for ability to race, though, I found it quite lacking. I was in the second one mile wave, which started at 11:20, after five other waves had already started. While I'm pretty sure the initial half mile and the first one mile wave swimmers were done, what we had to do was essentially merge into the traffic of the prior waves that were still in the water. And, though my intention was to go out for a moderate effort ... and I delivered on that intention ...
... I still planned to race the other swimmers in my wave, and I hoped to have an enjoyable swim. Instead, the entire mile was an exercise in swimming around, over and, in one case, under swimmers from the other waves. It was frustrating. About the only good part of the actual swim was that I could sight the purple caps from the other people in my wave, so at least I could track them and, when not dodging others, try to race them.
I am still very glad I did this. I would recommend this event to anyone who just wants to swim in this iconic body of water. And, after I got over my frustration with the swim experience, I reminded myself that that was always the goal - just to swim in the Serpentine.
Bucket list. Checked.
But, more important than the event or the race, is my deep thanks to all of the people who sponsored my swim to raise money for Turn2Us - my parents, Maia, Susan and Lisa, Neera, my swimming friends Cate, Ian, Justin, Rachael, Adam & Martin, the Lido Explorers, Sally and whoever "The Anonymous Lifeguard" is - allowing me to exceed my £1,001 fundraising target to get to £1,056!
