Swimmer's Daily

  • joe-middelerRead WCPO Cincinatti and see WLWT

    A beloved swim coach with the New Richmond Exempted Village School District died Friday in a mowing accident at his Clermont County home.

    Authorities said 63-year-old Joe Middeler was using a riding mower on his lawn in the 1800 block of US 52 in Moscow at about 6:30 p.m. when it rolled over an embankment and ended up on top of him.

    The sheriff’s office described Middeler’s mower as a SCAG Tiger Cub Commercial Zero Turn riding mower.

    Middeler’s wife, who was not home at the time, later found him at the bottom of the embankment and called 911, deputies said.

    The Clermont County Coroner ruled his death an accident.

  • stephanie rice photoGossip here on Mail Online

    Troubled Australian swimmer Grant Hackett has found a friend in Stephanie Rice.

    The former Olympian, who recently attended rehab in the US for sleeping pill addiction, is said to have grown close to the recently retired fellow swimmer.

    A report in Woman’s Day this week claims it’s common knowledge inside swimming circles that the pair have become very tight.

    An insider told the magazine that the 33-year-old father of two, who separated from wife Candice Alley last year, is ‘Stephanie’s type to a tee’.

    ‘They’re made for each other,’ the source claimed.

    Thumbnail photo by Music News Australia

  • katie-hoff-proposalShe said yes, see Detroit Free Press

    American swimmer Katie Hoff, a two-time Olympian who won two bronze medals and a silver at the 2008 Games in Beijing, threw out the first pitch before the Tampa Bay Rays closed a series with the Yankees at Tropicana Field today.

    Waiting for her at home plate was her boyfriend, former Michigan State fullback Todd Anderson, who dropped to one knee and proposed on the spot. Hoff said yes.

  • Don’t remember if I posted this back in 2013, but then it is worth re-sharing. Via Reddit

    Surfer watches GoPro footage only to find he swam 3 feet above Great White shark without realising

  • See video on TVNZ

    A British tourist is getting set to take the plunge and swim the Cook Strait tomorrow as part of an attempt to swim seven oceans around the world.

    Adam Walker will make the notorious sixteen nautical mile stretch down the Cook Strait as part of the Ocean’s Seven challenge – which Mr Walker describes as the seven hardest ocean swims on the planet.

    “Four people in the world have done it,” he says.

    “No British person has.”

  • Read FijiOne

    The Australian Sports Outreach Program, ASOP Sports Development Grant through their Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade has provided a grant of close to 20 thousand dollars to  Fiji Swimming.

    This is for its “Swim Safe” project initiative.

    The primary aim of the Project is to qualify the coaches of Fiji’s seven swim clubs, together with swim trainers from local schools to incorporate this “Swim Safe” initiative into their own swim programs.

    Coinciding with a coaches clinic this long weekend, visiting Australian coach Hayden Belshaw will also be part of Fiji Swimming’s Junior, Development and Elite Squad Easter Camp today and tomorrow.

    The “Swim Safe” Project will be conducted throughout the whole of Fiji.

    Photo by Frontierofficial

  • Read The Mirror

    Swimmer Rebecca Adlington has revealed the extent of thousands of cruel Twitter taunts which led to her having surgery to reduce the size of her nose.

    The four-time Olympic medallist said she had “fallen into fame” and never expected the recognition – and criticism – that would follow.

    She said she had been forced to block close to 4,000 Twitter trolls who subjected her to vile abuse about her nose and overall appearance.

    The newly retired athlete still refuses to confirm or deny rumours she underwent surgery to have her nose reduced in size and remove a bump.

    She told the Daily Mail: “If somebody else wants to know [that], well tough luck. It’s my life.

    rebecca adlington photo

    Photo by photoverulam

  • park-joon-hyukRead The Wall Street Journal

    “At first we didn’t think it was that serious,” Joon-hyuk said. But then the boat lurched further onto its side and the waters rose. “We heard the helicopters outside and told each other that the rescuers were coming.”

    Joon-hyuk and his friends helped a young girl, not even 10 years old, don a lifejacket and hoisted her upward through a door, where rescuers were waiting. (Joon-hyuk believes she eventually made it back to shore.)

    But Joon-hyuk and the other students were unable to reach the opening themselves, and began looking for another way out. The problem: by then, all other escape routes were blocked by water.

    So Joon-hyuk and several other students took the plunge. In the murky water, there was no clear route to safety, so he felt his way around. Eventually he sensed an opening, swam through it and emerged into the open water. About 20 seconds after he surfaced, he was rescued.

    “I wasn’t thinking about anything,” he said. “The only thing I was thinking about was coming back out of the water.”

  • Read The Atlantic

    Guanabara Bay, the site of several 2016 Olympic sailing events, has 78 times Brazil’s legally allowed limit of fecal pollution, and 195 times the U.S. limit. In addition to human waste, the bay is also a receptacle for trash from ships and the bay’s 15 adjacent communities, as well as toxic runoff from a former landfill. And its not just Guanabara–the ritzy Leblon and Ipanema beach areas are plagued with similar pollution problems. The state environmental agency, INEA, found that Leblon and Ipanema were unfit for swimming for 40 percent of 2011. Botafogo Beach had so much fecal pollution that it did not pass a single INEA test in 2013, according to the BBC.

    “In the waters just off Copacabana beach, the measurement of fecal coliform bacteria spiked to 16 times the Brazilian government’s satisfactory level as recently as three weeks ago, bad news for the marathon swimmers and triathletes set to compete there,” the AP noted in November.

    Olympic teams are getting grossed out and nervous.

    Photo by Rodrigo_Soldon