Julie Bradshaw

Julie Bradshaw is a teacher, business motivator, sports coach, swimmer, counsellor (therapist) and a coach of NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming), Time Line Therapy and has achieved considerable personal success especially in long distance, English Channel and Marathon swimming, where she currently holds several world records. She first swam the English Channel at the age of 15 and in 2002 did it again using the swimming stroke butterfly, which she completed in 14 hours, 18 minutes. This broke the previous record by over nine hours. Bradshaw has raised thousands for charities such as Breakthrough Breast Cancer, Child Line and several Children’s Hospices.^[1]

Bradshaw has earned her several honours.^[2] In 2004, she was nominated for the Sunday Times Inspirational Award. In 2006, she was awarded an MBE for 'Services to Swimming and Charity' which was the same year Loughborough University in recognition of her achievements conferred upon her an honorary doctorate.^[3] In 2007 Bradshaw was recognized with a place in the International Swimming Hall of Fame, Fort Lauderdale, USA.

Bradshaw completed a further achievement in the history of long distance butterfly swimming in July 2011. She circumnavigated the 28.5 miles course around Manhattan Island in New York in the fastest documented (stroke based records are not certified) butterfly time of 9 hours and 28 minutes. There is an acknowledged title in the swimming world that of the Triple Crown. A Triple Crown is an elite group who have swum the English Channel (22 miles), Catalina Channel (22 miles) and Manhattan Island (28.5 miles). Swimmers do this on freestyle, yet only two swimmers in the world have achieved two of the three on the proper traditional butterfly, Bradshaw being one and Vicki Keith (Canada) another.

Bradshaw assists and enables others interested in long distance swimming to achieve their goals, in particular those wishing to swim the English Channel through her voluntary work with The Channel Swimming association.^[4]

References