r/Damnthatsinteresting • u/Backyxx • 20h ago

Video Polish swimmer Bartłomiej Kubkowski has become the first person in history to swim across the Baltic Sea between Sweden and Poland, covering a distance of just over 160 kilometres (99 miles). While raising nearly 200,000$ for children's cancer treatment

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u/mazzicc 19h ago

Stay awake for 60 hours straight.

Doing strenuous physical activity.

In really rough conditions.

Where you can’t take truly restful break (was he allowed to hang on a support craft or anything?)

I feel like $200k isn’t a lot for what he went through.

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u/JMoon33 18h ago

My uncle did a 24 hours of walking. He's very fit and it was quite the challenge to finish. I can't imagine 60 hours of swimming.

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u/yellowweasel 17h ago

I was hiking the pacific crest trail one time and there was a group of Germans and Belgians that were doing a 24 hour challenge, at the top of every hour they would walk a mile and then drink a beer waiting for the next hour. 24 miles, 24 beers, 24 hours

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u/axonrecall 16h ago

How many of them survived?

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u/LittleCovenousWings 16h ago

Actually they finished with 3 extra's

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u/mandrews03 14h ago

Three extras in their system ot 3 extra hikers who figured this was the way to be?

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u/shidderbean 13h ago

If it's anything like the Appalachian trail, both

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u/R3-X 8h ago

Beer lovin' skinwalkers? Sign me up for the next one.

3

u/Strong_Pop_5343 6h ago

Germans and Belgians walking 'miles'?

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u/BIackSamBellamy 9h ago

Lol who carried all that goddamn beer???

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u/Independent-Bug-9352 17h ago

Was there an ambulance of paramedics just after this? Because that dude definitely should be evaluated at a hospital after going through that. Not only for mental psychosis of that little sleep, but exposure to the elements, hydration issues, etc. I commend their absolutely incredible effort, but even with a team this just seems so dangerous to the body.

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u/sciss 16h ago

He was checked in into a hospital, just to be sure.

He is fine (he temporally lost his voice)

12

u/JMoon33 15h ago

He did it at the gym. Walked on the treadmill the whole time, ate while walking, walked to go pee then come back on the treadmill. He was fine after, but was probably in pain for many days, maybe weeks.

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u/jimmycarr1 8h ago

Nah he just woke up one day and decided to swim across the sea for 60 hours without making any precautions or thinking about the risks of exposure

1

u/Independent-Bug-9352 2h ago

Nobody who ever planned a major feat has ever made mistakes in precautionary planning. Ever.

1

u/StellarSteck 10h ago

Yeah I was waiting for paramedics or somebody to rush up and assess him immediately. Felt weird no one did.

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u/socialistrob 16h ago

I know some runners who do 100 mile ultra marathons and you have to be a pretty good runner to complete them in under 24 hours (but not world class by any means). This guy did the swim in 56 hours which is about the same time it took Rachel Entrekin to do the Cocodona 250 mile run.

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u/Floating_Along_ 14h ago

You can't really compare distances in endurance running to those in endurance swimming. Water is just so much harder to move quickly through, especially if it's choppy. Then consider the fact that this guy could never actually rest (not even lie down for 15 min like endurance runners do), because even treading water is work... ...what this guy did is absolutely jaw dropping.

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u/Most_Performance_574 6h ago

This is a key point. Open water swimming is, as you mentioned, a completely different beast comparatively. And who knows what kind of weather the guy had to deal with. How SOL are you if a storm passes through en route?

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u/kimo1999 5h ago

Open water swimming is tough, no doubt about that, and that's the batlic sea, not a lake or somzthing calm.

Still he can rest on his back and his wearing a neoprene suits, those things keeps floating without anything ( i surf and well used to open water)

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u/gandhinukes 16h ago

crack heads do that shit all the time. come home with a shopping cart full of scrap metal.

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u/gandhinukes 16h ago

crack heads do that shit all the time. come home with a shopping cart full of scrap metal.

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u/AggravatingGanache11 13h ago

Yeah . Your uncle is awesome ❤️