July 9, 2020 - Croatian long-distance swimmer Dina Levacic, 24, announced on Wednesday that she intends to swim the 15-kilometer-long Gibraltar Strait between Spain and Morocco and the 34-kilometer-long North Channel between Northern Ireland and Scotland between August 10 and 21 this year.
"I have prepared well for these swimming marathons, I will do my best to succeed and I have no fear," Levacic said at a press conference in Split, as reported by Net.hr.
According to Dina, the preparations were cruel, especially for swimming in the North Channel, because it is one of the most demanding swimming marathons in the world.
"Strong sea currents and big waves are waiting for me in the Gibraltar Strait, but I believe that it will not create any difficulties for me. The North Channel is extremely demanding because, in addition to strong sea currents and jellyfish, the sea is very cold. But my preparations were harsh, I trained in the Adriatic Sea when the water temperature was 12 degrees and the air temperature was only five degrees. In addition, I trained on Peruca Lake and the rivers Cetina, Krka, Jadro and Zrmanja," explained Levacic.
The coronavirus pandemic is creating some difficulties, so Dina will have to swim these marathons, as she put it, “a little blindly,” because the borders of Morocco, where she is supposed to swim across Gibraltar, are closed.
She hopes that this will be resolved because when she enters Morocco, she will not have contact with anyone. She also said that currently in Northern Ireland, from which the North Channel is to be crossed, a 14-day quarantine is still valid for foreigners coming to that country, but she believes that this problem will be overcome as well.
The planned crossings of the Gibraltar Strait and the North Channel are the 5th and 6th stations of Dina's "Big Seven Marathons" project.
So far, she has swum the Catalina Pass in California, the English Channel in Europe, the Molokaʻa in Hawaii and Tsugar in Japan.
After the Gibraltar Strait and the North Channel, only the 26-kilometer-long Cook Pass, which connects the North and South Islands of New Zealand, will remain for her to swim.
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