Swimmer to raise funds for Childhood Cancer Foundation of South Africa
For this challenge, Stewien is combining her love of swimming with her dedication to helping others.
Krystle Stewien is preparing to take on the eight-mile charity challenge at the aQuellé Midmar Mile scheduled for February 6 and 7.
This challenging event involves swimming four miles – about six and a half kilometres, each day, over two days while raising funds for various charities.
This year, Stewien is swimming to support the Childhood Cancer Foundation of South Africa (CHOC).
Stewien attended Covenant College and Kenton Primary School for her junior years and matriculated from Bracken High School. She has long enjoyed swimming, and many of her best childhood memories were captured at the Alberton Swimming Pool with her parents, Marion and Duncan Geach, who reside in Brackendowns.
For this challenge, Stewien is combining her love of swimming with her dedication to helping others. She has previously completed six Midmar Miles. This will be her first attempt at the eight-mile challenge.
Stewien started training for the eight-mile charity challenge in September. Her practice includes swimming between two and three kilometres, five times a week. This sort of training requires discipline.
“Some days I feel strong in the water, so I’ll push further to four kilometres. Some days every stroke seems difficult, so I’ll do a shorter session focusing more on speed. But I never swim less than 1.2km,” said Stewien.
“I’ve also recently had a few lessons with MySwim School in Northriding to focus on stroke correction to make sure I’m not overworking and tiring myself out in the middle of the dam,” she added.
Mental strength
Stewien admitted that being mentally prepared for such charity challenges is a lot harder than the physical side, and there are days when it is such a struggle to get into a training swim session and she finds herself distracted.
But when Stewien is in the right frame of mind, she ends up counting laps. Sometimes she counts up to 80 laps, and she finds this exercise extremely tedious and it makes a swim much longer.
At Midmar Dam, the swim is broken up into four sections of 400m each. Every 400m swimmers go through a timing arch. “I have already begun visualising those when I’m in the pool. I’ll see that I’m coming up on 400m and imagine going through that arch,” said Stewien. She also visualises herself crossing the finish line. Stewien says these mental exercises will help her be better prepared for the upcoming fundraiser.
Asked what drives her to do this work, Stewien said: “Swimming has always been a passion of mine, and being able to use it to support such an important cause makes it even more rewarding. CHOC does incredible work for children facing cancer, and I am proud to support them.”
To participate in the eight-mile charity challenge Stewien must raise at least R10 000 for CHOC.
Anyone wanting to donate to Stewien’s campaign, click here.
