About South West Swim & The Team

Jason Tait – South West Swim Lead Coach & Founder

Jason is an experienced open water swimmer and coach, who has also dabbled in triathlon in the past.

Jason has taught and coached at all levels from non swimmer and aquaphobia to world and national qualifiers, medal winners and champions.

Jason started his career as a volunteer at Swindon Dolphin ASC, a local swimming club, teaching children from the age of four who were just learning to swim, through to national qualifiers and medal winners at a highly competitive level.  Jason still delivers the clubs Open Water training during the summer season .   Jason was also the open water coach and committee member for Wiltshire ASA for a number of years helping organise championship events for Wiltshire championships. 

Jason founded South West Swim in 2013/2014 as he noted there was a huge gap in the local area for qualified open water coaching and quality adult pool and 1-to-1 coaching. South West Swim filled this gap in the market place and  quickly became a swimmers favourite, leading the way in open water coaching in the area and building to be one of the largest adult swim coach providers in Swindon and Wiltshire, in both the lake and pool.  

Jason was one of the very first coaches to sit the Swim England Level 2 open water coaching course, and the STA Open water coaching course after their release.  To this day he is one of the only coaches to hold both qualifications in the Cotswolds and potentially the wider area.  Jason is also a qualified STA open water coaching tutor and was on the STA working group that helped develop the award winning version of the STA Level 2 open water qualification, helping develop the official course other coaches need to take to become open water coaches.

Jason is a Swim Smooth Certified coach and is an expert in front crawl stroke correction, training thousands of swimmers and triathletes.  Swim Smooth certification is no easy task to obtain, usually with a training time of 18-24 months in total and covering many in depth scenarios of various stroke faults.  Jason mixes this methodology with his own to provide a truly unique approach to swim correction, development and training principles.
Jason’s own swimming has taken a backseat over the past few years, as he is always lake or poolside helping others master their swimming.  However Jason has completed swims of all distances in pool and open water, up to Windermere one way swim (10.5 miles) and a half Ironman distance triathlon.

, Qualifications and Experience:

– Swim Smooth Certified Coach for Swindon, Cotswolds and surrounding areas of the South West of England

– STA Level 2 Open Water Coach

– STA Open Water Qualified Coaching Tutor

– STA Open Water Coaching Qualification Working Group Member

work – STA Certificate in Cold Water Swimming Coaching

 – Swim England Level 2 Open Water Coaching

– Swim England Level 1 & 2 Coaching

– Swim England Level 1 & 2 Teaching

– ALP Advance Aquaphobia Coach / ALP Official Swim School

– Level two fitness Instructor (Gym)

– Previous Open Water Lead Coach for Swindon Dolphin ASC

– Previous Open Water Coach and Committee member for Wiltshire ASA

– Triathlon Show London Official Swim Coach 2017 & 2018 (Swim Smooth Team)

– Swim Coach and Swim advisor to the SwimTayka Charity

– Event support for numerous local and national event companies, including the Henley Swim, Cotswold Big Swim & 113 Events

– Published in various media channels

– Consultant work for lake venues, swim & triathlon clubs

– Media consultancy work including work on BBC Top Gear as open water advisor.and numerous radio interviews

– RLSS Open Water Lifeguard

– NRASTC Safety Certificate

– First Aid at Work

– Foundation Safety & Rescue Training (FSRT)

– Powerboat Licence