This was a feat that no other swimmer had accomplished.

The 12-hour and 21-minute swim south along the coast from the Golden Gate Bridge was an exhausting feat, made all the more sweet by the knowledge that it would be a world first.Swimming through patches of jellyfish unscathed, with a nerve pain in her left shoulder, 

Catherine calmly commented: “I had a moment in my head, like, if my shoulder gets worse, I’ll be finishing this on one arm…But I’m sure after some ibuprofen, it’ll be back to normal.”

— Catherine BreedCatherine started swimming at 04:30am, riding the ebb tide that sucks water out of SF Bay, thought of as a ‘moving walkway’. She was accompanied by a support crew of nine people on a small boat, Jet Ski and kayak, who supported Catherine with navigation, safety, and gulping down a calorie shake every 30 minutes.

The support team also kept an eye out for dorsal fins in the area. There were also no shark sightings though, with Catherine having timed the swim for this time of year in September partly as it’s just before peak shark season off the Northern California coast.

“It definitely was the soulful swim I was looking for,” Breed said to the San Fransciso Chronicle. “It was fun in moments, and there were moments when I was ready to stop.”

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