Showing titles in Water Sports

Whether in lake, lido, river or sea, we know the benefits of swimming outdoors and in nature—environmentally friendly and accessible, it can influence our happiness, our energy and our inner tranquillity. Winter Swimming takes this one step further, as contact with cold water all year round can also have a significant positive impact on our physical health, confidence and well-being. Danish scientist Susanna Søberg leads us step by step into the icy water and explains the 'cold-shock response', the massive endorphin rush as our body reacts and adapts.

Beginning in the 1960s, this audiobook tells of the real-life adventures of the author as a boy. Encouraged by his parents to become more independent, Peter decided to see how far he could get in his family's small open dinghy, Calypso.

Leaving her garden to the mercy of the slugs, award-winning writer Alys Fowler set out in an inflatable kayak to explore Birmingham's canal network, full of little-used waterways where huge pike skulk and kingfishers dart. Her book is about noticing the wild everywhere and what it means to see beauty where you least expect it. What happens when someone who has learned to observe her external world in such detail decides to examine her internal world with the same care?

A powerful feminist nature writing by the pioneer of women's big wave surfing in Ireland. Easkey Britton provides a rare female perspective on surfing, exploring the mental skills it fosters and the need to recognize the value of the ocean and of nature's cycles in our lives. This is an incredibly inspiring exploration of the sea's role in the wellness of people and the planet, beautifully written by Easkey Britton - surfer, scientist, and social activist. For Easkey, the sea is a source of mental and physical well-being.

Feel the adrenaline rush as Dave Norell plunges over huge waterfalls, gets lost in the Philippine jungles, and experiences carnage in Costa Rica. In need of medical attention, Dave and his extreme kayaking friends trudge through waist-high sugar cane fields full of poisonous snakes, in search of a road that hasn't been washed out by recent flood-waters. Dave and fellow kayakers travel throughout Idaho, British Columbia, other parts of Canada and the US in their quest for whitewater adventure.

A must-have book for walkers, sailors and everyone interested in the natural world, How to Read Water unlocks the secrets of water in all its forms. Natural navigator Tristan Gooley imparts knowledge and teaches skills, tips and useful observations to help you navigate the landscape around you.

Written by one of the most revered surfers of his generation, Gerry Lopez's Surf Is Where You Find It is a collection of stories about a lifetime of surfing. But more than that, it is a collection of stories about the lessons learned from surfing. It presents 38 stories about those who have been influential in the sport - surfing anytime, anywhere, and in any way.

This is an audiobook for those who want to understand better how the water surrounding us affects our daily lives, how it imperceptibly but crucially shapes our actions and has shaped our landscape for millennia. It's for anyone who knows and loves our coast and who wants to understand, discover, surf or sail it better. Inspired by his own witnessing of the power of the sea through travelling around Britain's coastline in a panel van with his young family, William Thomson tells the story of the cycles of the sea.

The International Regulations for Preventing Collisions at Sea (COLREGS) are vital for maritime safety. You must be able to identify vessels during the day by their special shapes and at night time by their lights, and understand how they are likely to alter course or speed in a potential collision situation. Melanie Bartlett's audiobook provides a clear and authoritative explanation of each regulation. It will help any seafarer understand their responsibilities, meaning that everybody at sea will be safer.

A compulsive and unforgettable study of intensity, These Heavy Black Bones meditates on Blackness, identity, and the ecstasy of peak physical performance. In stunning prose, Rebecca charts her career's ascent, her singular love of the water, and lays bare the pressures within her swimming world.

From the author of the best-selling RYA Navigation Handbook, this audiobook is based on the RYA’s official title to support the RYA VHF Operator's Short Range Certificate examination. It expands upon the quick reference VHF Radio inc GMDSS book (G22) to assist with a deeper level of understanding which will help you pass the exam.

Humans, unlike other animals that are drawn to water, are not natural-born swimmers. We must be taught. Our evolutionary ancestors learned for survival; now in the 21st century, we swim in freezing Arctic waters and piranha-infested rivers to test our limits. Swimming is an introspective and silent sport in a chaotic and noisy age; it’s therapeutic for both the mind and body; and it's an adventurous way to get from point A to point B. It's also one route to that elusive, ecstatic state of flow.

Yusra Mardini fled her native Syria to the Turkish coast in 2015 and boarded a dinghy full of refugees bound for Greece. When the small and overcrowded boat's engine cut out, it began to sink. Yusra, her sister and two others took to the water, pushing the boat for three and a half hours in open water until they eventually landed on Lesbos, saving the lives of the passengers aboard.

By age twenty, at the height of the Jazz Age, Trudy Ederle was the most accomplished swimmer in the world. She’d won Olympic gold and set a host of world records. But the greatest challenge remained: the English Channel. Only a few swimmers, none of them women, had ever made the treacherous twenty-one mile crossing. Trudy’s failed first attempt seemed to confirm what many naysayers believed: No woman could possibly accomplish such a thing. In 1926, Ederle proved them wrong.

Liminal, transformative and increasingly elusive – far from a simple cloud of water droplets, fog is a state of mind. As mist drifted through a copse of trees, turning a familiar place strange and otherworldly, Laura Pashby snapped a photograph and an obsession began. Pashby hunts for fog, walks and swims in it, explores its often pivotal role in literature, mythology and history, as well as its environmental significance. There has been a 50 per cent drop in 'fog events' in the past fifty years, fog is drifting away without us noticing and the ecological impact could be calamitous.

When Richard “Frosty” Hesson was first approached by a young Jay Moriarty in 1990, the skinny kid with a sparkle in his eye only wanted one thing from the icon: His help in becoming a better surfer. Hesson, one of the first to conquer the huge waves off northern California known as Mavericks, recognized that the kid “had a vision.” Jay quickly demonstrated a resolve that reminded Frosty of his younger self, pursuing his goal with a seriousness far beyond his years. His attitude and work ethic earned Frosty’s respect and, eventually, his friendship.

On a dismal day at the end of October, 1968, a weekend sailor by the name of Donald Crowhurst set out from England in a flimsy trimaran, hoping to become the first solo sailor to circumnavigate the world nonstop. His was an exercise in over-arching ambition, delusion, and tragedy such as the world has seldom seen. Before it was over, the world media would be subject to a fraud of enormous proportions, and Crowhurst would die a madman in the middle of the Atlantic. What he left behind was a shattered boat, a shattered family, and this incredible story.

When Countrywise presenter Paul Heiney's son, Nicholas, committed suicide aged 23, Paul and his wife, Times columnist Libby Purves, were rocked to the core. Nicholas had been a highly gifted, promising young man, although he had struggled to keep his head above water at times as severe depression slowly dragged him down over many years.

The story is told beginning with the vision and desire to sail on the ocean, through the training and education, buying a boat, gaining experience, and finally embarking on a 1000nm journey to bring the boat home, singlehanded. An immersive nonfiction adventure story, Becoming a Sailor captures the scene as one would experience it. Becoming a Sailor also goes into technical detail about the repairs and additions to Sobrius, a 1972 Dufour Arpege, as well as the techniques the author had to learn in order to sail singlehanded on multiday passages.

In June 1994, Alvah Simon and his wife, Diana, set off in their 36-foot sailboat to explore the hauntingly beautiful world of icebergs, tundra, and fjords lying high above the Arctic Circle. Four months later, unexpected events would trap Simon alone on his boat, frozen in ice 100 miles from the nearest settlement, with the long polar night stretching into darkness for months to come.