Ned Denison, chairperson of the International Marathon Swimming Hall of Fame, announced Grace van der Byl of the USA as an Honor Swimmer in its Class of 2025.
From her roots as a national level competitive pool swimmer and age group coach, she transitioned seamlessly to the realm of channel crossings and marathon swimming as a soloist, relay extremist, and stage racer.
Steven Munatones has seen her up and down the coast of California, “She is elegant and relentless in the water. She is passionate and powerful, graceful in the water and grateful to others. From her records set across the Catalina Channel in the Pacific Ocean – in a blazing fast 7 hours 27 minutes – to lake swims at the SCAR Swim in Arizona and river swims at 8 Bridges in New York. She was a fireball on the ultra long relay swims with the Night Train Swimmers – no matter how cold or how rough or how long these swims were, she was swimming hard to the finish.
In addition, she continued to give back to the sport for years serving as an observer and support crew member for other channel swimmers.
What is great about Grace is that her passion is truly lifelong. A swimmer since the age of 2, her love of the sport has endured endless hours of tough training in both the pool and ocean.“
She has also won two awards from the Marathon Swimmers Federation: the 2012 Barra Award for Most Prolific Year and the 2014 Streeter Award for Service to Marathon Swimming. She was also named to the list of World’s 50 Most Adventurous Open Water Women.
Her distance relays with the Night Train Swimmers included a 482 km NT300 in San Francisco Bay over a 5-day period in 2015 together with Dave Holscher, Kimberley Chambers, Adam Eilath, Vito Bialla, and Ashley Horne, the 367 km California Coastal Swim alongfo the California coast for 5 days in 2013 with Vito Bialla, Hal McCormick Patrick Horn, Phil Cutti, David Holscher, Zach Jirkovsky, Luane Rowe, Blair Cannon, and Walter Bean Scott.
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