Hong Kong lawyers battle wind and waves to swim English Channel, starting the crossing only hours after their flight
- Eliza Chang, Eugene Wong and Allen Che are the first all-Hong Kong relay team to swim from the UK to France
- Each one battles their own demons, keeping their secrets to maintain morale as they get blown off course
Three lawyers became the first all-Hong Kong relay team to swim across the English Channel, but the challenge was made far harder by a dramatic change to their schedule. They stepped off the plane expecting three or four days to rest and prepare, but the weather was against them so they started that night.
Eliza Chang, Eugene Wong and Allen Che completed the crossing in 13 hours 48 minutes last week. The distance between England and France at the shortest point is around 35km, but due to tides and high winds, the team travelled over 60km.
“Without a chance to acclimatise, when we started swimming the channel that was the first time we had been in the water,” Wong said, adding that was a problem because the water was so much colder than Hong Kong.
“We hadn’t had a proper sleep, we hadn’t had time to recover. The reality sunk it. But we didn’t have the luxury of time to think about it.”
They tried to grab a few hours of sleep and preparation. But there were protests in Dover, so the 20-minute drive to the hotel took three hours. When they finally arrived, the three napped, ate and departed for the shoreline.
The first challenge was launching. The rules stipulate that the first swimmer has to leave the boat, swim to shore, exit the water and wave to the boat to signal they are on dry land and about to begin. The job fell to Chang.
“It was the around 1.30am. It was the first dip in the water, cold, choppy, pitch dark,” said Wong, a partner at Mayer Brown. Closer to shore, the waves were breaking and turbulent.
“Eliza was worried she couldn’t get to the beach. She was wondering, ‘what have I done, will we make it? Will we be the team that abandon or surrenders before we even start’. What she was doing was quite dramatic because of the conditions around shore.”
Fortunately, she managed her task and the adventure began from Samphire Hoe Beach underneath the famous White Cliffs of Dover. Wong took the second leg. The frigid water was tough to bear on entry but he warmed up eventually.
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“Alone, darkness, I can’t see anything, the water is still choppy. Quite a memorable start,” he said.
The second and third legs were the easiest in terms of conditions, but each swimmer was silently struggling.
Wong’s shoulder was causing him pain, while Chang, a managing partner at Cheng Yeung & Co, was becoming hypothermic and Che, a partner at Wong Hui & Co, was seasick.
“We all had our own little secret, our own difficulty. But none of us wanted to share it with the others. That was a moment of struggle for me.”
“But then the sun came up, we could see around us, the air temperate got warmer and the sea got calmer and it all began to come together.”
Chang added: “This has not been a walk in the park for us. There were times during our respective legs when each of us thought of giving up, whether to the pitch darkness, the cold and choppy waters, the fierce gusts, the unforgiving seasickness, the cramping limbs, the injured shoulders or otherwise.”
Even with the sun up, the conditions were still against them as they approached the French coast and tried to enter a harbour, so they made for a nearby beach. The change in destination added 2km and the final stretch fell to Wong. Eventually he landed on Wissant beach.
“I went at full speed, totally ignoring my shoulder problem,” he said.
The team raised HK$1.3 million for Splash, a charity that teaches domestic helpers to swim, children from low income background and children with special needs.
You can donate to the teams Splash page here.
