BBC CWR team starts swimming challenge

Rosie Eaton, Trish Adudu, Phil Upton, Josh Giltrap and Debbie Woods (left to right) make up BBC CWR's team

A team from the BBC in Coventry has started its swimming challenge for Children in Need.

The Thousand Mile Challenge will see all BBC local radio stations across the country attempt to swim 24 miles each, to add up to the 1,000-mile total.

The BBC CWR team of five were set a target of one mile each (65 lengths), every day for five days until Friday.

But breakfast presenter Phil Upton was ruled out of the swims on Monday and Tuesday due to illness, leaving producer Debbie Woods to do his opening mile.

She is planning to swim five miles on Tuesday in one go, as fellow team members - newsreader Josh Giltrap, reporter Rosie Eaton and afternoon show presenter Trish Adudu - also carry on the challenge.

Producer Ms Woods said she was "quite good" as a child.

But she added: "(I) gave it up when I was 12, because I didn't want to get up at four in the morning and force my parents to get up at four in the morning to go to the pool.

"That's a commitment and a complete lifestyle change for the whole family."

Debbie Woods did Phil Upton's mile on Monday, because he was absent due to illness

Her efforts followed Trish Adudu getting the station under way from 08:00 GMT at The Alan Higgs Centre in Coventry.

Before starting, the presenter said she did not think she had been "this nervous since my Caesarean".

She added: "I've not had any sleep. I've just dreamt of swimming and Jaws."

Children in Need is the BBC charity that aims to help improve the lives of disadvantaged children and young people around the UK.

Following her swim, Adudu said it was "amazing" and the furthest she had swum.

"Honestly, without the support of our wonderful team, there's no way I could have got us through that, because at one moment I thought 'I'm just gonna get out the pool'."

"Just think about why we're doing this. It's a mental thing, isn't it?... You know that if you just keep going... I'll be fine."

Adudu, who was last in a pool decades ago, said: "Just being scared of the water, I've overcome that fear today."

Trish Adudu (left) and Debbie Woods smiled for the camera on the opening day of the challenge in Coventry