Local resident Amy Wamsley intends to swim across the English Channel in late May. (Submitted photo)
Fundraiser event to aid local swimmer’s English Channel goal
- Published: April 10, 2025
A fundraiser for Amy’s Swimventure — a nonprofit founded in 2024 by local resident Amy Wamsley — will be held Saturday, April 12, at Peach’s Grill, 2 p.m.–midnight.
The event — which will feature live music from Rob Heiliger, Ben Clonch and Friends, Danny Sauers and Pinehouse, among others, as well as raffles — is intended to help fund Wamsley’s goal of swimming the English Channel, about which the News has reported in the past.
Wamsley told the News this week that the fundraiser will, in part, help pay for a support team to accompany her in the historically difficult 21-mile swim. Wamsley is set to undertake the swim in late May.
Accompanying Wamsley will be local residents Vanessa Gueth and Victoria Walters, who will travel alongside Wamsley in a boat as part of her support team. Gueth, a nurse, will serve as medical support, responsible for checking for signs of hypothermia, dehydration, administering an EpiPen if needed, and a host of other possibilities. Walters will serve as Wamsley’s handler, using her background as a therapeutic movement specialist to help Wamsley stay on track with stretching, breathing techniques and making sure she doesn’t feel “rushed or overwhelmed.”
Wamsley is also in the process of hiring a person to oversee her nutrition during the swim, which will consist of 30 brief feeding sessions to stave off caloric depletion, as well as the administration of motion sickness medicine. Wamsley’s team will mostly communicate with her via hand signals during the channel crossing.
Both Gueth and Walters will assist Wamsley in recovering from swims leading up to the channel crossing and the channel swim itself.
“It’s taxing on your body, so they’ll be making sure after the swim that I’m hydrated, I have all the nutrients and minerals I need and that my body is stretched and relaxed,” Wamsley said.
Wamsley is set to swim in the Maumee River on April 19 as part of a water quality monitor training event for Partners for Clean Streams, a Perrysburg-based nonprofit focused on water quality. The nonprofit’s work aligns with the work of Wamsley’s own Amy’s Swimventure, which also advocates for clean and vibrant waterways in Ohio.
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