Student swims across channel in less than 10 hours
BY LEE YUK PENG Friday July 16, 2004 [The Star Newspaper]

 

MALACCA: Lennard Lee, a medical student at Cambridge University, successfully swam non-stop across the 33.6km-wide English Channel in nine hours and 45 minutes on Tuesday.

Lennard, 20, has become the second Malaysian to achieve the feat after Datuk Abdul Malik Mydin, 29, from Penang, who made it in 17 hours and 35 minutes on Aug 3 last year.

Lennard Tan inspired by Abdul Malik

His father Dr Lee Siow Ming, who tailed his son in a boat with his wife Monica Liew, said Lennard started at 8.34am (London time) from Dover and completed the swim at 6.19pm in Calais, France, on Tuesday.

The weather was good when Lennard started but the sea was rough during the second half of the swim, said Dr Lee in a telephone interview from London.

“My heart went out to him. I didn't know he was so determined.

Proud father Dr Lee Siow Ming “I saw him undergo a lot of pain as he pushed on,” said Dr Lee, adding that the temperature was about 16°C.

Lennard said by telephone that reading about Abdul Malik's feat inspired him to take up the challenge.

Lennard said he was confident that he could do it.

“I trained for four months and it never occurred to me that it was difficult.

“I was cold, tired and my arms were aching. He said although he was overwhelmed by the pain, he never thought of giving up.

“If I stopped swimming, it would have to be because someone pulled me out of the sea,” he said.

Lennard, who sustained cuts and bruises all over his body, said he was happy to see the French shore but never thought it would take him so long to reach it.

“It hurts to even just walk now,” he said, adding that he was grateful to his two coaches – Freda and Alison Streeter (a mother-and-daughter team) – for training him and to his parents for their support.

Lennard said his attempt was also meant to help raise funds for Christie Hospital, a cancer hospital in Manchester and to build a new swimming pool for his university.

Lennard swimming across the English Channel in nine hours and 45 minutes.

He raised £1,000 (RM7,000) and would split the money between the hospital and the university.

“It is not about me, I want to help Christie because one in every three persons contract cancer,” he said.

Lennard also said he was happy his uncle Dr Lee Yew Meng helped to raise funds for the Seck Kia Eenh Cancer Fund.

He was surprised to be told that the donations had reached RM11,000.

Dr Lee Yew Meng, a heart surgeon at a private hospital here, said Lennard's swim was worth supporting and that was why he helped out.

The fund's committee chairman Chan Swee Huat said RM11,716.50 had been received from donors as at yesterday.