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?
How about this guy that swam across Lake Superior earlier this month?
www.detnews.com/.../metro-271109.htm
He has now swam all five Great Lakes. However, I think he does crawl and it looks like he wears a wet suit. Wimp! ;)
Originally posted by Karen Duggan
Did she use breaststroke kick? I would think that would change things dramatically.
I have a hard time staying focused during the hour swim, so 64 hours is totally preposterous for me to even fathom! And then to do it fly! I couldn't do it, wouldn't want to even, but if someone had a gun pointed at my head... I'd tell them to pull the trigger! Just kidding. If someone had a gun pointed to my head and I had to swim 64 hours of fly, I'd much prefer a breaststroke kick and an inflatable pillow to sleep on :p
Being on the pilot boat WATCHING this event would make me die of boredom!
I wonder how she swam this because 77 km in 64 hours is an average of 1.2 km per hour. In other words her overall pace was 5:00 (five minutes) per 100 meters. She must have taken a lot of rest stops, but I don't know how you can do anything for that long without falling asleep, especially when you're exerting that amount of effort.
Did she use breaststroke kick? I would think that would change things dramatically.
I have a hard time staying focused during the hour swim, so 64 hours is totally preposterous for me to even fathom! And then to do it fly! I couldn't do it, wouldn't want to even, but if someone had a gun pointed at my head... I'd tell them to pull the trigger! Just kidding. If someone had a gun pointed to my head and I had to swim 64 hours of fly, I'd much prefer a breaststroke kick and an inflatable pillow to sleep on :p
Someone needs to explain this to me. 100 meters in 5 minutes is excruciatingly slow. I realize that's an average but at that pace I have to wonder if it truly was a continuous swim. Are you allowed to get out for a few minutes during this thing? Geochuck adds some nice factors that would impact her pace but I would think if you fought all those items, it would be terrilby hard to swim for 64 hours straight.
I'll say it - there's something fishy about this.
Lake Ontario 77 k could be like swimming 400k wind water currents river flows water temp. The part of the lake were she swam is always warm. The winds are generally westerly which blows warm water to that end of the lake. I have not seen any thing that says these things. Just that she made it. As you swim a long swim the farther you go the bigger the drop off eg you may start at 30 min a mile and end up swimming 1 hr per mile. ( I would start at the pace of the race about 22 min a mile end up depended on the race, have even ended up just trying to get to the finish line) 77k is nearly 50 miles. The 35 mile cross lake ontarioswim, Niagara On The Lake to Toronto could take 10 to 30 or even 40 hrs dependig on Wind direction, water temperature, and the Niagara River current, which is wind relevant. Wind direction can drop the temp 20 or even 30 degrees in less than one hr.
