THE daughter of ex-Warrington rugby league star Mike Peers, who died last year, has completed a sponsored swim raising more than £4,000

Michelle Peers, 33, swam a total of 44 miles for ‘Diabetes UK’ amounting to double the distance of the English Channel and in record timing, beating the set challenge of 12 weeks.

Michelle, who works as a claims manager for Freeway Insurance, completed the sponsored swim in seven weeks and three days, waking up at 6am each day to complete her goal of 70 lengths per day which increased to 80 towards the end of the challenge.

Detailing how the family run business she has worked at for 10 years showed her huge support throughout the challenge, she explained how they decided to match the money she raised of more than £2,000 and encouraged many in the company to donate too.

The Latchford resident said: “There isn’t a lot of awareness of what diabetes means and I wanted to raise more awareness of how the disease can affect people like it affected my dad.

“I just wanted to make my dad proud. It helped me a lot, I didn’t want to just sit around and feel sorry for myself, I wanted to do something to help.”

Warrington Guardian:

Mike Peers died on September 7 last year having lived with the disease for a long time, but is well remembered for making his mark, having played for The Wire between 1974 and 1979.

Jan, Michelle's mum, described the pride she felt for her daughter’s achievement.

She added: “It’s overwhelming how proud I am of her and what an amazing achievement it is. The swim gave her something to focus on and was a good coping mechanism."

Michelle, who also completed a 5k sponsored swim in 2019 for mental health charity Mind and played water polo in her youth, described the challenges she faced along the way, swimming five days a week and sometimes more.

She said: “It was tough getting up every day, I’m not a morning person. But I struggled more emotionally by the end rather than physically.

“Once I was halfway through, I knew I was going to complete it so it was then realising it would end, it had helped me mentally so much."

Describing her dad as a ‘role model’ and a ‘huge character’, Michelle explained how she has taken a temporary (and well deserved) break from the pool since completing the swim but said she will be carrying on swimming and will continue to raise money for the Diabetes charity in the future.

To learn more about the disease or to make a donation please visit the Diabetes UK website diabetes.org.uk