SwimRun Advice

Updated April 2025

Swimrun Advice is the biggest and best website for people new to this exhilarating sport. We were even recommended by the British newspaper 'The Guardian' last year!

Are you getting into this new sport for the first time? We know what it's like! It sounds a bit strange at first, running in your wetsuit and swimming in your shoes, with no transitions for changing gear. But this inspiring adventure sport is growing very quickly in popularity.

We have recently reviewed the scientific research for using swim paddles. While paddles can improve your swim speed, there are a few surprising elements to consider!

To help you make an informed choice about the best swim paddles, we have reviewed the evidence on our swimrun paddle page. Check it out!

Interestingly, NO manufacturer of carbon paddles has provided ANY independent scientific evidence or research to support their claims!

Swimrun Advice
- RACE CALENDARS 2025

If you are wondering what it is all about, you should go to our page on What Is Swimrun first. It explains what's involved, and how it came into existence.

For inspiration, or if you want to search for an event, check our NEW race calendars for events in 2025:

Swimrun Calendar Europe 2025

and Swimrun Calendar USA/Canada/Rest of the World 2025

You can also Search for Races listed by Country Here. Just click on that link to go to our race page where events are listed by country!

If you are an event organiser, please feel free to contact us with your dates! 2025 is shaping up to be very exciting!

Swimrun Advice

If you're keen to start as soon as possible, you should definitely look at our detailed page about your first event. This is our cheat sheet for how to get the most out of your first event – all the essentials distilled into one page.

As experienced marathon runners and triathletes, we decided to try the new endurance sport of swimrun. But good, knowledgeable advice can be hard to find, so we've set up this website to introduce people to this thrilling world of swimming and running from island to island - running in your wetsuit and swimming in your running shoes!

Underwater view of a swimrun competitor swimming over a shallow sand back, in light green water.

Approaching the end of a swim section!

We have competed in several events, including -

Hvar, Croatia;
Engadin in Switzerland;
Bologna in Italy,
and the full distance Ötillö World Series race in the United Kingdom, 30 miles out into the Atlantic Ocean on the Isles of Scilly.

ÖtillÖ

As the inventors of the sport, the company Ötillö from Sweden deserve a special mention. You can read about the company at our Ötillö page.

In the photo below, we are on the left, with Ötillö Race Director (at that time) Mats Skott on the right of the picture. This image was taken at the prize-giving after completing the sprint distance event at Engadin, Switzerland. But don't be too impressed – we hadn't won our group, but we DID come 2nd in the raffle for some gear!

Four swimrunners with their raffle prizes, standing on grass inside a big white tent, with the race director.

Swimrun Engadin - we are on the left.

The most important page on this site is probably Race Day Advice. It's chock-full of information on pre-race preparation, and tips and tricks for during the event too.

Some are borrowed from our marathon running experience, and others are hard-earned gems from our Swimrun races in very different environments. Click on the race advice link to see what you can learn.

Swimrun Advice

Equipment - What do I need??

At first, we found ourselves wondering what gear we would need, and what to wear. Check out our swim run equipment page to find out exactly what gear you will need! We even have a page dedicated to socks reviewing some of the best on the market.

We have a page on swimrun training gadgets to help you get the most out of your training sessions. The latest addition is about the best bone conduction headphones for swimrun training. They are super-light, don't slip or slide around, and sound fantastic!

One piece of equipment that every swimrunner needs is goggles. We review the most popular swim goggles, and have a special page about custom-fit goggles for people who have problems finding goggles that don't leak or exert too much pressure. These are made by Danish company THEMAGIC 5. These custom-fit goggles are the most high-tech swim goggles on the planet, period! Check them out at our dedicated page here.

Magic5 Gold Mirror custom fit swim goggles

Our biggest page is probably our reviews of suitable watches - take a look at our affordable GPS watch reviews to find out what you should be looking for.

Wetsuit Reviews

Choosing a suitable wetsuit is one of the biggest challenges – Mogsy even had to have a suit custom-made to her own measurements, to get a fit that would be comfortable for up to 8 hours of wear! You can read about our own suits.

We have carried out a review of the best dedicated wetsuits to help newcomers see what's available. Swedish company ARK have announced their incredible new suit which looks like a big leap forward in wetsuit design and construction – at a price. Check it out at our Wetsuit Reviews page.

In warm weather or hot climates, you can wear a triathlon suit instead of a wetsuit. This has a couple of interesting advantages, as we describe in our page on hot weather swimrun gear.

Mogsy's favourite wetsuit is the Colting Women's suit pictured below - click here to go to Amazon for more information and the best price!

A picture of a black Colting swimrun wetsuit.

Colting Womens Wetsuit

Injuries

We have found that there is a small but significant risk of picking up a trauma during training and racing, especially in salt water events. Discover what might go wrong at our page on Swimrun Injuries. And be sure to read all the way to the bottom to find out about the most dangerous risk!

Swimrun events were originally for teams of 2 persons, but in recent years it has been possible to compete as a solo racer. In September 2020, Michal Jablonski completed a sprint distance event of 12km as a solo racer, but he took his dog Venus with him! Read more about this story at our page here!

A man in a red triathlon suit and sunglasses, standing at the side of a road, rubbing sunscreen into his right arm, with blue sky in the background.

Richard before a 5 hour training stint

Swimrun Advice
- Series Organisers

This new sport is growing in popularity around the world, and we have pages with details of organisers who hold a series of races. For example;

USA: Ötillö swimrun USA

Canada: Mudskipper Challenge

UK: Keen as Mustard Events

and Gritty Rascals Events

Europe/USA: Otillo World Series

Canary Islands, Spain: Canary Islands

Portugal, including Madeira; Portugal Series

Australia: Swimrun Australia

Italy: The Swimrun Italy series

But you can also check our event calendars for Europe 2025 as well as for the USA/Rest of World 2025, OR you can search by country here!

Are you an organiser who holds one or more events? Contact us and we can add you to our list of organisers, and feature your races in a dedicated web page for your organisation.

But now let's get back to the basics!

You'll need to find out about all the issues involved in Swim Run before you can become competitive in races.

Look at the drop-down menu above to see the various areas we are covering, from

how to start , including a special beginners guide,
events calendars,
equipment reviews,
event info reviews,
and our own personal journey.

Training

We estimated that the Isles of Scilly Swimrun would take us from 7 to 8 hours to complete, and so we incorporated a marathon into our training plan, to build up our endurance. The event was in Milan, Italy. We finished at a comfortable pace, bearing in mind that we were treating this as another training session. Check out our Milan race report.

We think that training for a full marathon or a half-marathon is excellent endurance work before a long-distance Swimrun event (say, over 30km). You can read about other marathons we have personally completed.

A man and woman cross the finish line at the Honolulu Marathon, holding their hands up.

Richard and Mogsy cross the finish line at the Honolulu marathon

Swim Training

It's also good to look for dedicated swimming events or series, to focus on swimming for a period. We entered the Barbados Open Water Festival, which involved 5 swim races over 5 days, finishing with a 3.3 km event (2 miles). Read our page about the event - and our training.

A small group of people sitting on a sand bank by blue water, watching the competitors in a swimrun race at the second swim leg at the Isles of Scilly, UK.

Watching swimrunners start the second swim leg, Isles of Scilly

For our most recent BIG race, in the Isles of Scilly, UK, we kept a training log. You can read about how we planned and carried out our training at our Training Page.

Of course, don't forget to read 'About Us' to find out who's writing this site - anyone can put up a website, but it's good to know that the authors of this site are genuine SwimRunners!

This website is very active, and we are updating it continuously, especially the race calendars for Europe and USA/Canada/Rest Of the World.

So do bookmark this page or add it to your RSS feed, and come back soon!

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