A CHARITABLE Black Country man is preparing to take the plunge on a mammoth charity swimming challenge.

Damian Campbell, from Quarry Bank, is taking part in a 21-mile swimming challenge at Halesowen Leisure Centre later this month in aid of the region’s community first responders.

The 40-year-old will test his body to the limit as he attempts to swim non-stop for more than 12 hours.

He said: “I’m as prepared as I can be. I’ve been training an average of four or five times a week for the past six months – three days in the pool and two in the gym – so I don’t think I could have done any more.

“But it’s almost as much a mental challenge as it is a physical one, as swimming non-stop for 12 hours is going to be really boring and painful.

“So far I’ve been doing shorter swims at a quicker pace, but there would be no way of keeping it up for the whole duration.

“I just want to get it over with now. It’s been playing on my mind for a long time, but even if it takes me 14 hours – or even more – I will complete it because it will really help the first responders out.”

Damian is fundraising for the West Midlands Ambulance first responders after the group was chosen by the Midland Centre Caravan and Motorhome Club, of which Damian is the junior liaison officer, as its ‘charity of the year’.

“One of our members is a community paramedic and we think the work they do voluntarily is fantastic and were more than happy to support them,” he added.

“As a group we fundraise for a different charity between October and October every year and the first responders have been so grateful that we decided to raise money for them again next year too.”

Rather than donating the money raised by the club straight to the first responders, it will instead be used to purchase much-needed equipment.

Damian, who doesn’t have a fundraising target, said: “I just want to raise as much as possible. We’ve already raised £1,800 through different events with our caravan club which we have used to buy equipment for the responders to use in training the public in life saving techniques.

“We have already brought them a state of the art CPR dummy and have enough money for a family of normal CPR dummies, next we want to buy a laptop which runs alongside the dummies.

“It will be great at our AGM in October if we can lay out all the equipment we have bought so for the first time in all the years we have been fundraising that we can actually see what our money has gone towards.”

He will be diving head first into the charity challenge at the Halesowen Leisure Centre pool on Monday, August 27.