Neil Gilson, a former international athlete from Devon, has become the first person to swim the 10 largest lakes in Switzerland, covering a total of about 230 miles (370km). He finished the challenge on Wednesday after swimming the 45-mile length of Lac Léman (Lake Geneva) in just over 22 hours.
A 22-hour crossing of Lac Léman
Gilson, a father of three, staggered out of the lake after the gruelling swim. His 12-year-old daughter, Lily, and 10-year-old son, Jack, were in the water waiting as he neared the end to accompany him across the finishing line.
“They swam the last 200m with me,” Gilson said. “There were tears in my goggles. For the whole challenge, I was envisioning that moment. It kept me going through some difficult times – lovely.”
From pool training to lake challenges
Gilson, 40, was once ranked second in Britain for the 1500-metre freestyle. After finishing race swimming, he turned to endurance challenges. In 2024, he swam across Lac Léman in 22 hours and nine minutes, a world record. He then decided to tackle all 10 Swiss lakes.
He prepared with countless hours in the pool at a leisure centre, the sea off the north Devon coast, and the gym. There have been blips along the way. Gilson admits that a swim of about 40 miles in Lake Maggiore this summer almost broke him. It was colder than he anticipated, forcing him to swim more quickly to raise his core temperature, which used more energy than planned. He had “nothing left” for the last few miles.
Lake Thun also proved surprisingly difficult as the pressure to complete the challenge – and the physical effort – caught up with him. After clambering out of that lake, he said: “My arms don't like me and I feel shattered.”
Support team and family motivation
Gilson said he found swimming in lakes more demanding than the sea. “They're more unpredictable. You can get some really choppy conditions because of the wind and you can hit walls of cold water.”
He began Léman on Tuesday morning and finished on Wednesday lunchtime. He admitted that 18 hours into the swim, he thought of giving up. “It was so tough in the night – the current was strong. I felt really close to stopping but what kept me going was my family waiting there.”
His support team, which accompanied him in a boat, helped by giving him coffee – and saying “the right things”. He just missed out on beating his own world record for Léman, but is confident Guinness World Records will recognise him as the first to complete what has been billed the Legend of the Lakes challenge – and that in subsequent years, other ultra-swimmers may try to do it more quickly.
Raising awareness for Pans and Pandas
As well as taking on the extraordinary challenge, Gilson is seeking to draw attention to a neuropsychiatric condition, Pandas, that affected his son at 18 months old. People with Pans or Pandas experience a variety of symptoms ranging from mental health symptoms to changes in behaviour and difficulties with movement.
Jack was diagnosed with Pandas after catching tonsillitis. “He went to bed a happy, healthy little boy, and woke up as someone we didn't recognise, gripped by aggression, OCD [obsessive-compulsive disorder], tics and intense fear; he refused to eat, wouldn't leave the house or even speak. It was terrifying,” Gilson said.
Jack is doing well – as shown by his joining his dad for the last leg of his swim – but Gilson said: “The challenge has always been about more than swimming. Every lake, every kilometre and every difficult moment has been about raising awareness of Pans and Pandas. It's a condition that isn't rare but is rarely diagnosed. Raising awareness of it means more than anything.”
