Shipwreck Coast Swim Series return excites south-west swimmers

The Shipwreck Coast Swim Series will run on the January 2 at Port Fairy, 23rd at Warrnambool and February 13 for the finale at Port Campbell in a new COVID-safe format.

The popular 1.2-kilometre long course and 500-metre short course swims will return but will be done in waves of 50 swimmers at a time and culminating with a feature swim finale wave.

The feature wave is designed for the faster swimmers and those who have traditionally won their age groups.

Registrations for the event have also changed. Interested swimmers will have to register online only, which closes at 5pm the day prior to each swim of the series.

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Thomas, a past series winner in 2017, said it was exciting to get back into racing following a year of cancelled events, including the iconic Lorne Pier to Pub.

"It's a nice local event and kind of fun with all the camaraderie with the people you race against and no one takes it super serious but it's still competitive," she said.

"I still think a lot of people will do it (with new format) but it might be good to have that last wave and we get to race against different ages we haven't raced against.

"This is more just a chance to race as we haven't raced for a while.

"It will be the first time we get back into racing with surf lifesaving not starting until February with anything major and it will be nice to get around that."

Christie-Crane, who is aiming for a treble of victories in the series in 2021, was happy to see the series returning in the new year and thanked the organisers for getting the event off the ground.

"I'm glad it's back as it's a good opportunity to race as we haven't had so many recently," he told The Standard.

"It's fun. Usually in January we (Warrnambool Swimming Club) have country champs at the end of month and we haven't had any racing this year and it's good to get back into that.

"It (the series) is a good building block for longer events. I don't usually do long events but it always good to have them under the belt."

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