Swimming with Jimmy

‘Do nothing’.

So exhorts Jimmy as he overhauls the strokes, kicks and breathing of his adult swim learners at Cardiff International Pool.

They plunge, roll, extend. As they learn to let go and glide, they’re overcome with a sense of joy, freedom and bodily ease.

For journalist Selma Chalabi, Jimmy’s classes have been a lifeline. She joined the class to improve her swimming technique, but what she found was something so much more profound. Jimmy’s unique and philosophical style of teaching taught her not only how to move at one with the water, but also how to live her life - when to move and when to rest and how to breathe.

It’s in the pool that Selma meets a community of learners - all ages, shapes and cultures - who are doing so much more than learning to swim. There’s Maggs, who is determined to face her worst fear and overcome a deep childhood trauma, and working mum Doris, whose moment of peace is when she submerges into the water. As for Darius, he has transformed from absolute beginner to potential competitor.

This is a world you might find in any leisure centre around the country. A place so familiar to us, and yet in its depths and shallows, in its pools of chlorine and azure light, are stories of courage, determination, bliss and finding new meaning in the water.

Producer and presenter: Selma Chalabi
Executive Producer: Leonie Thomas
Sound Designer: Mike Woolley
Sound engineers: Meic Parry and Katie Hill

With deepest gratitude to Jimmy, his students, and the staff at Cardiff International Pool.

An Overcoat Media production for BBC Radio 4