So, the name Jim Mc Conica is familiar to me and though I've never met him, he never ceases to amaze.
He is in the middle of a seven day residency in the Pacific Ocean between Anacapa Island and the mainland. He'll be crossing once per day and 2x on the seventh. Awesome and crazy.
Reliable sources early this morning say that Jim's record swim on the 1st day took too much out of him and he did not finish the second day's swim.
Who are your sources? They don't know what they're talking about. He did finish the Day 2 swim (yesterday), in 5:23:53.
It is true that the Day 1 swim took more out of him than he expected. That is because he had a rare day of perfect, glassy conditions in the Santa Barbara Channel. This offered the opportunity to go after the record, set just three weeks earlier by his 17-year old teammate Nick Vargas (a sub-4:40 500 Freestyler).
Given this rare opportunity, Jim put everything he had into the Day 1 swim and smashed the record by 20 minutes. His time of 4:38:07 will likely stand for a while.
Despite an all-out 12.4-mile swim the day before, Jim came back on Day 2 and did it again. His 5:23:53 is still among the fastest Anacapa crossings in history. It was also the first time anyone has completed Anacapa crossings on two consecutive days.
Immediately after the Day 2 swim, Jim decided that after the record swim and unprecedented back-to-back, he had nothing left to prove, and called it a week. In the words of his crew chief: "Could he keep going? Yes. But it would be miserable, not fun or rewarding."
Hope that clarifies matters.
Reliable sources early this morning say that Jim's record swim on the 1st day took too much out of him and he did not finish the second day's swim.
Who are your sources? They don't know what they're talking about. He did finish the Day 2 swim (yesterday), in 5:23:53.
It is true that the Day 1 swim took more out of him than he expected. That is because he had a rare day of perfect, glassy conditions in the Santa Barbara Channel. This offered the opportunity to go after the record, set just three weeks earlier by his 17-year old teammate Nick Vargas (a sub-4:40 500 Freestyler).
Given this rare opportunity, Jim put everything he had into the Day 1 swim and smashed the record by 20 minutes. His time of 4:38:07 will likely stand for a while.
Despite an all-out 12.4-mile swim the day before, Jim came back on Day 2 and did it again. His 5:23:53 is still among the fastest Anacapa crossings in history. It was also the first time anyone has completed Anacapa crossings on two consecutive days.
Immediately after the Day 2 swim, Jim decided that after the record swim and unprecedented back-to-back, he had nothing left to prove, and called it a week. In the words of his crew chief: "Could he keep going? Yes. But it would be miserable, not fun or rewarding."
Hope that clarifies matters.
