Open Water

Maya Merhige, 17, Adds Crossing of New Zealand’s Cook Strait American teenager Maya Merhige this weekend completed a crossing of the Cook Strait in New Zealand, the latest in the 17-year-old myriad open water feats. Merhige made the crossing in 14 hours, 8 minutes, 36 seconds on Friday, swimming 22 ...

Neil Agius, Sharon van Rouwendaal Honored at WOWSA Awards The World Open Water Swimming Association unveiled the 2024 WOWSA Awards this week, honoring the best in open-water swimming across six categories. Malta’s Neil Agius earned runner-up for Man of the Year and won the Performance of the Year Aw...

World Aquatics Launches Open Water Swimming World Rankings World Aquatics has launched, for the first time ever, its Open Water Swimming World Ranking system, creating new and exciting opportunities for athletes and National Federations, it announced on Wednesday. The World Aquatics Open Water Swimm...

New Zealand Marathon Swimmer Breanna Ward Achieves Triple CrownAnd Doing It For Shark Survival Inspirational New Zealand marathon swimmer and passionate ocean conservationist Breanna Ward has joined a select band of swimmers to complete the country’s triple crown of marathon crossings – her final s....

Sid Cassidy Named 2025 Benjamin Franklin Award Winner by CSCAA Sid Cassidy, a long-serving official and advocate for open water swimming, was named the 2025 recipient of the Benjamin Franklin Award by the College Swimming Coaches Association of America on Thursday. Cassidy has spent the last 20 year...

Keaton Jones Wins 4 Gold Medals, Sets 5 World Records at World Ice Swimming Championships American Olympian Keaton Jones set five world records and won four gold medals at this month’s International Ice Swimming Association World Championships. The Cal swimmer and Olympic finalist in the men’s 200 b...

Ben Wainman, Ella Dyson Win Titles at CSCAA Open Water Championships Saginaw Valley State’s Ben Wainman and Ella Dyson of Rice University took home individual titles Sunday at the CSCAA Open Water National Championship. Dyson successfully defended her title from 2022, the last edition of the meet, a...

World Aquatics Open Water World Cup to Open 2025 Season in Egypt World Aquatics on Tuesday announced the schedule for the 2025 Open Water World Cup, which will begin in February in Egypt. The first four stops on the five-event tour were released on Tuesday for the tour’s 19th season. They’ll start i...

Americans Joe Zemaitis, Gracie van der Byl Lead IMSHOF 2025 Class Americans Joe Zemaitis and Gracie van der Byl lead six honor swimmers in the International Marathon Swimming Hall of Fame Class of 2025. Joining them in being inducted next spring are honor swimmers Simon Ercoli of Italy, Steve Stieve...

Swimming Canada to Join USA Swimming’s 2025 Open Water Nationals Swimming Canada will partner with USA Swimming to use the latter’s 2025 Open Water Nationals to select its national team for the 2025 World Championships. The event will take place April 4-6 at Nathan Benderson Park in Sarasota, Fla. I...

The World Open Water Swimming Association (WOWSA) has banned Bulgarian swimmer Tsanko Tsankov from future world record ratification, claiming he falsified documents and claimed a false world record swim. Tsankov swam a 100K in the Danube River to celebrate Unification Day on Sept. 6, and later claim...

Swim for the Alligator Lighthouse Open Water Race Continues to Raise Money for Florida Keys Landmark More than 300 swimmers from the United States and several other countries competed in an 8-mile open-water challenge Saturday to raise awareness to fund restoration of an aging lighthouse off the Fl....

Open Water Swimmers Bettina Fabian, Leonie Beck Recovering after Olympic Marathon Swimmers Bettina Fabian of Hungary and Leonie Beck of Germany posted to social media about ill effects from the Olympic marathon swim in Paris’ River Seine. Beck posted to her Instagram stories that she had “vomited 9 ...

World Aquatics Cancels Practice Session in River Seine Despite ‘Good’ Test Results World Aquatics on Tuesday canceled a practice session in the River Seine due to water quality concerns, casting further doubt on the marathon swim of the Paris Olympics being able to be held there. The decision was ma...

Paris Olympics: River Seine Water Quality Forces Men’s Triathlon Postponement The Olympic men’s triathlon has been postponed a day due to water quality in the River Seine, the Paris Olympics announced on Tuesday. The race was due to take place on Tuesday but it has been moved to a 10:45 a.m. start t...

Epic Swim Maui Will Circumnavigate Island While Pushing For Ocean Health, Honoring Duke Kahanamoku Over the next few weeks, 14 open water swimmers from around the world will circumnavigate the island of Maui. The event, entitled Epic Swim Maui, is the first event in the Global Expedition Swim Series...

Maya Merhige, a 16-year-old marathon swimmer has successfully conquered the English Channel  making her one of the youngest swimmers in history to achieve the Triple Crown of Open Water Swimming. Merhige swam the English Channel (20.5 miles or 33 km) in just 11 hours and 39 minutes on July 13, 2024....

Paris Open Water Prep Differs for Mariah Denigan, Katie Grimes Mariah Denigan likes to joke with her teammates that the 1500 freestyle in the pool feels like a sprint. She omitted, perhaps strategically, her teammates’ response to that. But when it came to U.S. Olympic Trials in Indianapolis last mo...

World Aquatics Confirms 13 Additional Swimmers for Olympic 10K Races World Aquatics on Tuesday confirmed 13 additional swimmers for the Olympic open-water races in Paris on the basis of their times in the pool. Among the notable names joining the open water fray are veteran medal contenders Felix Au...

Paris Olympics Reveal Vaires-sur-Marne as Open Water Alternative to Seine The Paris Olympic organizing committee on Friday revealed its backup plan if the Rive Seine is not suitable for open water swimming at the Olympics next month. A Paris 2024 spokesperson told Reuters that the rowing venue at th...