Kingston Woman Swims Lake Ontario and Breaks Two Records
Darren McEwen
Thursday, August 18, 2005 6:34 AM
Marathon swimmer Vicki Keith is catching up on some much-needed rest as she, once again, enters the record books.
The Kingston woman completed her swim across Lake Ontario late Wednesday night.
Kieth swam 77 kilometres butterfly, breaking her old record but fell just short of a plan to swim 80 kilometres.
The 44-year-old woman also set a record for spending the longest amount of time swimming in open water. Keith, who didn't plan to set the record, was in the lake for 64 hours. She made the gruelling trek to support a local charity.
Keith became the first and only person to complete a double-crossing of the Great Lake 19 years ago.
From www.cfra.com/.../index.asp
Isn't it crazy? How does one do fly for 64 hours straight?
Former Member
Originally posted by pmbchill
I wonder what she thought about. You would really have to like yourself to converse with yourself for that long. Hopefully she didn't have some lame song in her head. That would be torture! Wait a minute.....speaking of torture, 64 hour of fly. I'd like to know how her arms felt the next day. What an incredible event!
Beatles song "It's A Hard Days Night".
Vicki Keith ???? Vicki Keith C.M. O. Ont.
Vicki Keith was described as an unlikely athlete, not apt to succeed in any sport. In school she was last to be picked for teams. No matter how this made her feel, she refused to accept the negative comments made about her abilities.
Originally posted by geochuck
Beatles song "It's A Hard Days Night".
Good choice! ;)
Of course, she might also have tried the traveling song from my school kid days, "100 bottles of beer in a wall.. a hundred bottles of beer... take one down, pass it around... 99 bottles of beer in a wall..." which if she started w/ maybe a thousand bottles might last a bit longer than starting with 100. But all that beer is probably dehydrating. ;)
Also, George, thanks for the background. I was one of those "last chosen" ppl when I was in school--except that even so, I'm still not quite... QUITE ready for 64 hours of butterfly. :eek: But I'm all the more impressed by her resolve and courage. But...BUTTERFLY?? WOW! Just WOW!
Originally posted by gull80
...likens wearing a wet suit in a marathon swim to completing the Tour de France on a moped."
Great, now all the tris will go add mopeds to their collection of toys.
Thought you may like this site. Lots of marathon swimming stuff. Ted is a friend of mine and he has a famous swimming dog http://www.sdogv.com/swim.html
She wore a wet suit???? Not a true swim.
Now this is a true swimmer.
From 1956 onwards, Abouheif’s triumphs were both impressive and recurrent. He won the Michigan Race (60 km) which entailed 36 hours swimming, pocketing $15,000, a fortune at that time. The list goes on. Abouheif was five times winner of the St. John Lake race in NorthWest Quebec, in icy water. He then won the "Montreal", a relay race which he won alone for about 28 hours because his partner fell ill ( I was in this race). He won the Capri - Naples four or five times and the Rio de la Plata in which he took part at his own cost because of some obscure intrigue in the Federation. This race was the longest of his career (250 km) from Rosario to Buenos Aires - 60 hours of swimming. He says that it would be too tedious to list all the races he won or countries he visited.
She didn't wear a wet suit. Warning: Tri's should not read the following excerpt.
"Marathon Swimmers can not use wet suits. Wet Suits provide extra buoyancy that can lead to artificially increased speed, or apparent endurance, of the person wearing the suit. Even in the frigid waters of the English Channel, the marathon swimming governing bodies refuse to recognise or monitor swims involving the use of wet suits. American swimmer Ted Erikson, who swam the second two-way crossing of the English Channel in 1965, likens wearing a wet suit in a marathon swim to completing the Tour de France on a moped."
I don't think she wore the wetsuit, she did it by the marathon swim rules. I could be wrong though.
Some of the stuff Vicki accomplished: http://soloswims.com/keith.htm
As a comparison Abou Heif 60k in 36 hours Swimming crawl could be thought of as slow. But the winds in Lake Michigan that day were North Westerly and made for slow time.
