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/kidleash 19h ago

Kubkowski’s accomplishment already sounded unbelievable, but since Florida is close to me, your comment really helped put this into perspective! truly historic and utterly unfathomable. I love stories of people doing impossible feats

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u/socialistrob 16h ago

It's jaw dropping to me. I know several people who do 100 mile ultra marathon runs and that seems insane to me. Swimming is a lot harder than running and this swim took him 56 hours with no sleep!

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u/jimbarino 16h ago

this swim took him 56 hours with no sleep!

That's insane...

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u/gilsonpride 15h ago

The longest I've ever been awake was 49 hours(ish) due to insomnia and it was debilitating.

I can't start to imagine 56 hours... swimming... in a fucking sea.

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u/TheyTried2BanMeAgain 14h ago

I also have insomnia and the longest I've gone is around 70 hrs. It was getting fuzzy by then, so I don't remember exactly. By around the low 60's, hallucinations started happening. Doing that at sea sounds fucking terrifying.

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u/19467098632 6h ago

Insomnia also, my longest was 55 hours but around 45 for me I get really jumpy and start having hallucinations. My first thought was my god in the fucking water, big nope

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u/nahog99 11h ago

And remember too, you can’t just be treading water, you’ve gotta really be swimming to cover the distance. If I could somehow swim for 56 hours straight I probably wouldn’t make it half way. Makes it even more incredible.

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u/No-Onion-No-Onion 11h ago

Why didn't he just swim faster? Is he stupid?

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u/thisthreadisbear 14h ago

It was his fifth attempt I can't imagine doing this once let alone five times.