Courtesy of Lambton Shield, Lake Huron.
59-year-old financial service professional Elizabeth Fry has done so much in her prolific career that she was deservedly inducted in the International Marathon Swimming Hall of Fame in its Class of 2014.
But she is not slowing down. Not at all. Not yet.
On Saturday, she finished a 34.5-mile (55.5 km) cross-border swim in Lake Huron, traversing one of the Great Lakes from Port Sanilac, Michigan (USA) to Port Franks, Ontario (Canada) in 20 hours 53 minutes.
John Bulsza, who previously completed his own crossing of Lake Huron along the same course in 1996 in 26 hours 49 minutes, served as Fry’s swim master with Solo Swims of Ontario.
Her other marathon swims in the Great Lakes include the 20 km Embrace the Challenge in Lake Erie from Sturgeon Point, New York (USA) to Crystal Beach, Ontario (Canada) and a 50.5 km crossing of Lake Ontario from Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario to Marilyn Bell Park in Toronto in 15 hours 46 minutes, both in 2017.
Her goal is to do a major marathon swim in all five Great Lakes.
“I do not know how she does what she does,” observes Steven Munatones. “She does swims that have not been done before like four consecutive double crossings of the four lakes in the SCAR Swim Challenge, really hard two-way channel crossings, double Ederles, and a clockwise (i.e., against the tides) circumnavigation swim around Manhattan in addition to running one of the major charity swims in America – the 25 km St. Vincent’s Foundation Swim Across the Sound – and holds down a high-pressured job in New York City.”
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