Many athletes love to race in competitive open water swims.
Some swim to check off achievements on their bucket list.
Others swim for pure enjoyment and to challenge themselves physiologically and psychologically.
Jessica Kieras, PhD was the fastest swimmer at the 4-day 4-stage SCAR Swim Challenge in Arizona in 2019, but the 43-year-old from Oregon has also has challenged herself in places where she loves to swim: from the California Channel Islands including Anacapa (20 hours 36 minutes), Santa Barbara (24 hours 7 minutes), Santa Cruz (9 hours 26 minutes), as well as lakes (Waldo Lake, Applegate Lake, Cultus Lake, Little Cultus Lake, and Deer Lake) in Oregon and down rivers in North Dakota and Minnesota.
Yesterday, she enjoyed herself in a self-designed course along the Colorado River, starting in Blythe, California.
She explains, “I ended up going over 75 miles in 21 hours 27 minutes. The current was moving. We were all ready for a longer swim so we went on a post-swim swim for 2 and a half hours to round it out to [a cumulative total of] 24 hours. I really had a great time with [former Navy SEAL] Dave Loeffler who was our crew chief and boat pilot. He just did an amazing job with everything. I swam backstroke for maybe half the time after the first six hours.”
Why not? With all the natural beauty she witnessed on her back in such a remote location of America, she wanted to soak it all in.
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