Ex-Olympic swimmer turned headteacher Helen Smart found dead by her four-year-old daughter
Olympic swimmer Helen Smart was tragically found dead by her four-year-old daughter who told her husband: ‘Daddy, I can’t wake mummy up.’
The mother-of-two, 42, was unresponsive when her daughter Heidi tried to get in with her at 4am during a family celebration in the Lake District.
The family were at a large cottage on the banks of Lake Coniston and Helen had been paddle boarding at dusk on Friday night just hours before she died.
Her mother, Linda, told Mailonline: ‘Heidi had woken up in the night and tried to get into bed with her. She said to her daddy: ”Mummy won’t wake up”.
‘He said: ”Oh she must be very tired Heidi – you go back to bed.” ‘He put the torch on and he said later that when he looked he could tell.’
Fighting back tears, Linda continued: ‘We are just in so much shock. You jump from believing it to not believing it.
‘She had been paddle boarding a few hours before and had never even been ill apart from her knees swelling from swimming.’
‘We’re distraught. They don’t know what it is but they think it must have happened shortly after she went to bed. She just died in her sleep.’
Helen had been for a morning swim at a country club near her home in Wigan on Friday before they drove up to Cumbria for her brother Robert’s 40th birthday.
The former Olympian had gone with her husband, Heidi and young son Stanley along with her brother’s family, mother Linda and father John.
Speaking at the family home in Wigan, Linda said: ‘At midnight, she went to bed telling me: ‘I’ll go to bed now mum as I know I’ll be woken at 6am by Heidi.
‘I just want to get some sleep in as I’ve had a long day.’
Linda added: ‘Robert woke us up at 4am and said: ‘Mum, dad you need to keep up – we think Helen’s died.
‘We just ran up and followed up and there she was in bed.
‘I touched her foot and she was cold. I walked round and to the side of her and she looked asleep but you could tell she was gone.
‘I just said: ”Why couldn’t it have been me.” I would have happily swapped places with her. That’s not the way round it should have been. I just thought, no no.’
Earlier, Helen’s father John paid a heartbreaking tribute to his daughter on Facebook – sharing a photo of him, his partner, Linda, and Helen smiling together in a family photo.
He wrote: ‘Helen was our pride and joy… we are so proud of her… she lit up a room as soon as she arrived.. Linda and I can’t comprehend how she could just simply go to sleep and not wake up?! xx’
Helen was a world level competitive swimmer and backstroke specialist who won a bronze medal at the 1998 Commonwealth Games in Kuala Lumpur and silver medals at the World and European Championships.