Sue Phillips' Marathon Swim Story
12/01/20 • 48 min
My guest today is fellow Oregonian Sue Phillips. While Sue assured me that her story was not that interesting, she kept coming up with stories... I fondly remember playing leap frog with her in Lake Massawippi last year, but that was just the beginning... she's lost her kayaker around Lido Key, ridden the waves in the Chesapeake, and swam the width in Tahoe during a pandemic. Everyone has a story. I hope you enjoy Sue's!
In her own words: Sue is a middle-aged swimmer, camper, scientist-civil servant, mother, trail runner and beginner rower. She has no stand-out achievements in any of these defining activities, although her 17 year-old daughter is pretty dang cool, she's supported some extremely important conservation science, and is purported to be quite a good swim companion. Swimming and supporting other swimmers are where she finds her greatest joy, particularly if she can do these things while camping, She's not swum terribly far or in any extraordinary conditions, although she's found all attempts to date to pile on distance and adversity to be quite fun, and is regularly and incrementally pushing limits in both.
Questions, comments, feedback, or if you'd like to be a guest on Marathon Swim Stories, email me! mailto:[email protected]
Stay in touch by joining our email list at http://intrepidwater.com
Join a supportive group of limit pushers at The Marathon Swimming Collective
Music credit:
Epic Inspiration by Rafael Krux
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/5447-epic-inspiration-
License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Swimming sounds courtesy of swimmer Todd Lantry.
My guest today is fellow Oregonian Sue Phillips. While Sue assured me that her story was not that interesting, she kept coming up with stories... I fondly remember playing leap frog with her in Lake Massawippi last year, but that was just the beginning... she's lost her kayaker around Lido Key, ridden the waves in the Chesapeake, and swam the width in Tahoe during a pandemic. Everyone has a story. I hope you enjoy Sue's!
In her own words: Sue is a middle-aged swimmer, camper, scientist-civil servant, mother, trail runner and beginner rower. She has no stand-out achievements in any of these defining activities, although her 17 year-old daughter is pretty dang cool, she's supported some extremely important conservation science, and is purported to be quite a good swim companion. Swimming and supporting other swimmers are where she finds her greatest joy, particularly if she can do these things while camping, She's not swum terribly far or in any extraordinary conditions, although she's found all attempts to date to pile on distance and adversity to be quite fun, and is regularly and incrementally pushing limits in both.
Questions, comments, feedback, or if you'd like to be a guest on Marathon Swim Stories, email me! mailto:[email protected]
Stay in touch by joining our email list at http://intrepidwater.com
Join a supportive group of limit pushers at The Marathon Swimming Collective
Music credit:
Epic Inspiration by Rafael Krux
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/5447-epic-inspiration-
License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Swimming sounds courtesy of swimmer Todd Lantry.
Previous Episode
Lori King's Marathon Swim Story
Today I spoke with the first woman to swim around the island of Bermuda, Lori King. Upon rediscovering her love of swimming later is life, Lori tried to politely decline an invitation to swim in the open water, strongly preferring the pool. Needless to say, she eventually found her rhythm and got over her fears. There's quite a bit of mom chat in this episode. About how hard it can be, but also how having kids mentally trains you to get through the tough parts of marathon swimming. Once you get to the start line, all you have to do is swim. I hope you enjoy this episode.
In her own words: Lori King grew up in Norristown Pennsylvania and started swimming competitively by age 5. In college, she swam Division I for La Salle University. After college, she temporarily fell away from swimming, moved to New York City, married and had two children. She began a career as a research analyst for the Visiting Nurse Service Research Center, which eventually led her to earn a Masters of Public Health, from Columbia University (2010).
As her career progressed, she felt something was missing in her life and returned to swimming in 2004. In 2006, she was introduced to open water swimming and her lifelong passion evolved. In 2010, she competed in her 1st open water event, followed rapidly, by 6 and 12-mile open water swims, in Bermuda and Key West, respectively.
While trying to juggle family life and swimming, she has since competed in numerous open water marathon events, such as the Catalina channel swim, the Manhattan Island swim, the 120-mile 8 Bridges Hudson River Staged Swim, Capri-Napoli, Ibiza Marathon swim, & Kalamata Greece swim to name a few.
On June 15-16, 2016, Lori became the first woman (second person) to successful swim the 36.5 miles around the island of Bermuda in just over 21 hours.
In December of 2016 Lori was awarded the Global Marathon Swimmer Yudovin Award for most adventurous swim by the Marathon Swimmers Federation for her Bermuda swim. Lori has used her swimming to speak to swim teams and organizations aimed at empowering girls and was featured on “heroes on our Island” television news segment.
Settled in Long Island, New York, family comes first for Lori but with their support she is able to live her dreams and reach her goals one swim at a time.
Questions, comments, feedback, or if you'd like to be a guest on Marathon Swim Stories, email me! mailto:[email protected]
Stay in touch by joining our email list at http://intrepidwater.com
Join a supportive group of limit pushers at The Marathon Swimming Collective
Music credit:
Epic Inspiration by Rafael Krux
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/5447-epic-inspiration-
License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Swimming sounds courtesy of swimmer Todd Lantry.
Next Episode
Amy Gubser's Marathon Swim Story
If you've been listening to Marathon Swim Stories for awhile, you’re familiar with my frequent refrain, "I love that". At times, I wish I had a more interesting response, but it's true! I just love it - all of it! Like my guest today, Amy Gubser, I'm in love with open water and marathon swimming. And I love every marathon swim story. It's the one hour a week that I drop everything and just listen. I'm smitten and I'm recruiting! Trying to cast my net far and wide. If you know someone who's marathon swimming intrigued, send them my way [email protected]. I want everyone to learn to swim efficiently, experience self discovery, and uncover deep seated determination. I want everyone to effuse joy like Amy. I hope you enjoy this episode!
In her own words: I was a swimmer at university of Michigan 1986-1990...after college I hung up the suit and started my career in nursing and my family. I have a husband, Greg, whom I met being an ocean lifeguard. We have been married 28 years. We have 2 adult children. I was busy with life for many years. 6 years ago, my daughter was getting ready to leave home to go to college. I needed to find something for myself! I had a friend who was a Southend rowing club member who challenged me to swim with him, I had every excuse in the book but he saw right through these excuses and still asked me to swim. I reluctantly, agreed to swim with him in February, no wetsuit, 10 degree water Celsius/50F.
I put my feet in the water and felt the shock. I had a panic attack, and started to cry. He looked at me and told me to put my face in the water and swim. I did! The shock was almost unbearable, but I kept swimming. Then, I started to feel a warmth come over me! Every cell in my body came alive, it was exhilarating! I was immediately hooked!
I found my people and my pod! I just started small swims then progressed to bigger swims! I swim and I love it!!!!
Questions, comments, feedback, or if you'd like to be a guest on Marathon Swim Stories, email me! mailto:[email protected]
Stay in touch by joining our email list at http://intrepidwater.com
Join a supportive group of limit pushers at The Marathon Swimming Collective
Music credit:
Epic Inspiration by Rafael Krux
Link: https://filmmusic.io/song/5447-epic-inspiration-
License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Swimming sounds courtesy of swimmer Todd Lantry.
If you like this episode you’ll love
Episode Comments
Generate a badge
Get a badge for your website that links back to this episode
<a href="https://goodpods.com/podcasts/marathon-swim-stories-233810/sue-phillips-marathon-swim-story-26224959"> <img src="https://storage.googleapis.com/goodpods-images-bucket/badges/generic-badge-1.svg" alt="listen to sue phillips' marathon swim story on goodpods" style="width: 225px" /> </a>
Copy