In the early hours of Sept. 8, 2023, Jennifer Whitlock stood on Samphire Hoe beach in Dover, England. She was smeared head-to-toe with homemade lanolin to prevent chafing from her swimsuit or anything else that might rub. “I make my own lanolin because I don’t like the smell of wet sheep,” she explains. “I have lots of great fragrance oils in the house, and I choose instead to make my lanolin smell like a coconut, suntan-lotion kind of concoction.”
She had gargled with ulcer medication to coat her tongue and protect it from the impending salt intake from the water. She was also smothered with enough thick, white, pasty Desitin to stop diaper rash in an entire small country. This was to shield her from the excessive sun exposure that she would endure during her extended time in the English Channel. “It’s largely zinc oxide. There isn’t a sunscreen that can stand up to 14 hours in the salt water, so anything that could get sunburned gets coated in a nice layer of Desitin,” she says. “I looked like Casper the Friendly Swimming Ghost.”
If she were able to swim in a straight line from Dover to Wissant, France, the distance across would be 21 miles. However, currents and tides usually push swimmers off a direct course, adding sometimes considerable mileage and time — and, of course, a swimmer’s speed and ability are also factors. The world record for the fastest English Channel swim, set the very same day that Whitlock swam, is 6 hours, 45 minutes. The world’s record for the longest crossing is just over 29 hours.
At approximately 3 that morning, Whitlock pulled her goggles down over her eyes — careful not to smear them with Desitin — stepped into the waters of the English Channel and began swimming. And swimming.
And swimming.