Ashleigh Bulcraig (43) from Nairn is preparing to swim the length of the Channel with other swimmers in a fundraising relay for spinal injury charity Aspire.
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00 [MUSIC PLAYING]
00:04 So I'm Ashley.
00:06 I'm a pelvic health physio in my professional life.
00:11 But at home, I'm a mom of three that are 13, 12, and 9.
00:18 And I've always swam since a young age competitively.
00:23 And I've set myself a challenge to swim across the channel
00:27 in a really for a charity called Aspire.
00:30 It's 22 miles.
00:32 So you start at Dover, and you swim across to France.
00:36 There's six of us in the team.
00:38 And we're all given a number from one to six.
00:42 And we swim for an hour at a time until we get to France.
00:49 The charity Aspire is a spinal injuries charity.
00:54 And we kind of rehab people from when
00:56 they've had their injury right up to kind of--
01:00 so it's a really worthwhile charity.
01:03 And they've been doing this swim for the last 10, 20 years.
01:06 So they're kind of really--
01:07 they know what they're doing.
01:08 Amazing.
01:09 How did you get to know the charity in general
01:11 and the fundraising?
01:12 So I've been doing open water swimming
01:15 for the last five, six years.
01:18 And they have an outdoor society magazine.
01:20 And in the magazine, it says, do you
01:22 want to swim the channel in a relay?
01:24 And it's for charity.
01:25 It's really special to me because I'm a physio.
01:27 And I used to do neurological rehab.
01:29 So to do something for spinal injuries,
01:30 but also at the same time do something
01:32 that's really challenging, worthwhile for my children
01:36 to see me do something special is kind of the driver.
01:40 And to keep that and keep doing these things as I get older.
01:44 So I've had the months to come.
01:46 Yeah.
01:46 Also, I would say this time of year, because it's January,
01:49 it's just getting in the pool, working on technique,
01:52 just endurance, just getting used to kind of doing that.
01:55 And in the winter, we're then--
01:56 like in the summer, as it gets warmer,
01:58 getting into the sea.
02:00 But part of the charity, we have three training weekends
02:03 down in Dover.
02:05 And everybody that's doing this boat trip goes down to Dover.
02:09 And you train.
02:10 And you get to practice on the boat.
02:12 And you kind of get a feel of meeting your teams,
02:14 a bit of camaraderie.
02:16 We're getting hoodies made up with our things
02:19 so that we can--
02:20 because it's quite hard because obviously I'm up here.
02:22 And the other ones down in England
02:23 will be training together maybe at times.
02:26 But I've definitely come up to spotlights.
02:30 Yeah, so Eileen, and you're going
02:32 to start doing some fun dreams eating things.
02:34 So can you tell me a bit more about the Skipping Horses
02:36 squad?
02:36 Yeah.
02:37 So I have a quiz at the Royal British Legion
02:40 in Nairn on the 3rd of February, 7th of 30.
02:45 So it's teams of four, 20 pounds ahead.
02:48 And it's just really a fun quiz, just like with raffles.
02:51 Yeah, just to start raising money.
02:54 I've got an afternoon tea booked in Fintorn.
02:58 And yeah, just lots of little events,
03:01 wine raffles and kind of lucky squares,
03:03 just to kind of-- and a Just Giving page as well,
03:06 which is obviously kind of my main base to kind of work
03:09 out for.