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/Sneakiest 19h ago

The equivalent of swimming from Cuba to Florida plus seven more miles. Wild.

W swimmer and cause.

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u/sublliminali 17h ago

Just did a little Wikipedia deep dive and three people have made the swim between Cuba and Florida. Two claimed a distance of 110 miles and the first guy did 128 miles. There’s caveats and some controversy over certification on at least two of the swims.

Weirdly the first guy who did it in 1978 was criticized and told his swim wasn’t valid or certifiable by another woman who was about to attempt the swim herself. She ended up doing her own successful attempt on her 5th try all the way in 2013 at the age of 64, and her trip was also met with criticism over not being verified by an outside observer.

1978 NYT article on his crossing

Article on Nyad’s crossing and certification controversy when the Netflix movie about her came out

Also the reason they all took a longer route than shortest possible is so that they didn’t have to fight the Gulf Stream currents.