I was destined to be a water person. As they say, it was in my DNA. There is a picture of my Mom pregnant with me sitting on the beach in Ocean City, New Jersey. At a young age I learned from former gold medal Olympian, Jack Medica, how to swim competitively. At that time butterfly was not even a competitive event in the Olympics, but I was taught to swim it at 6 years old. I peaked at the ripe young age of 10 years old. Fortunately my parents did not push me to be the best. After swimming summers and winters, my parents sensed that I was burned out at 10 and allowed me to find a good balance in sports from that time on. They sent me to camp in Maine the next 3 years where I experienced my first open water swim in the lake. Each year at camp, braving the leeches, I would look forward to the “swim to the island,” which was a major summer event.

I continued to swim competitively in high school. I was mainly a sprinter. Anything over 100 yards was too long for me. Once I graduated from high school I stopped swimming competitively, but still enjoyed body surfing when good surf was to be found.

After a bad car accident in 1977, I returned to swimming in the pool. Doctor’s orders to help recover from a neck and back injury. I haven’t looked back. I was hooked again. In 1984 I discovered open water again in Boulder doing my first 1-mile open water swim. I tried triathlon for a few years, but quickly realized when I was one of the first ones out of the water, then passed no one on the bike or run, that I needed to focus on swimming in open water only and have been doing just that ever since.