Though it may not appear so at first glance, this article by Braden Keith at SwimSwam is kind of incredible... definitely unexpected, and ultimately vindicating of this Forum and this thread:
Excerpts:
<blockquote>Diana Nyad's swim, whether legitimate or not, was the biggest newsmaker in swimming of 2013.</blockquote>
<blockquote>This particular... award is not one that specifies ‘good’ or ‘bad’. Much in the mold of Time Magazine, we instead look at who was the biggest news-maker in swimming over the course of 2013, be it for something good or something bad.</blockquote>
<blockquote>The evidence and arguments on both sides are rather convincing, and whenever money’s in play, the motive exists.</blockquote>
<blockquote>It created questions over whether or not a personal profit was to be gained, and if that was enough to cause Nyad to fudge the rules. It created rifts in swimming. It created unity in swimming. </blockquote>
OK, just saw some dumb-a$$ commercial for Bing that showed DN and thanked her for "being brave and persevering" and included her in the same group as women serving in combat.
AAHHHH!!!!
I will not use Bing now.
Why the hell would anyone use Bing in the first place?
Have you read @heart's blog yet? It is great. She is a law professor at University of California-Hastings, and like @KarenT is bringing a valuable scholarly perspective to the sport of marathon swimming.
She has recently written a couple of interesting posts on the DN affair:
Thanks for the hat tip, @evmo. I'm hard at work on the paper and hope to be done in a few days. It's turning out to be really interesting. I'll be happy to share the draft here and on the blog when it's finished.
One thing I'm finding out reading marathon swimming historiographies and memoirs is that, during the "golden age" of marathoning competitions, between the '60s and '70s, there seemed to be a strong prevalent notion of the rules, accompanied by a "no big deal" attitude toward them. Penny Dean, when <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Just-Try-More-Penny-Dean/dp/1452584990/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1390494914&sr=8-1&keywords=just+try+one+more">retelling her Golden Gate swim</a> in 1965, says matter-of-factly that she was cold, touched the boat, and was promptly DQ'd. Her discussion of the rules in <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Open-Water-Swimming-Complete-Triathletes/dp/0880117044/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1390494950&sr=1-2">her manual</a> is mostly in the competition context (where they arguably matter more) and she basically concludes as follows: (1) There are rules about not kicking and hitting other swimmers. (2) They are not enforced and people do whatever they want. (3) Since there's no enforcement, you have to learn how to deal with it. (4) Let me teach you some retaliation techniques.
That pretty much sums up any discussion of integrity and rule compliance in the sport in her manual.
While this thread may have little relevance to swimming, your post is from leftfield (sorry I don’t have a futball analogy)
This is certainly an example of DN not pandering to the Oprah audience but as the author notes equating atheism and spirituality does indeed seem wishy-washy to some.
@SuirThing Rubbish. I've seen the bottom of a boat in the Channel. While it wasn't sinking, it wasn't the angle from which one would want to see their pilot boat. Not then, nor any other time in my life, nor in any other foxhole, has it ever even occurred to me to ask the question @SuirThing postulates.
Per what @david_barra asks, as an open water swimmer & atheist, I feel lucky to be able to experience the almost ineffable wonder of the universe and the connection we all feel in the sea, regardless of our credo or lack thereof.
<blockquote>The reason why my swim is called, "The First Person to Swim from Cuba to Florida without a Shark Cage" isn't really to make the point that our team was willing to take the risk of being attacked by a shark out there, though that risk was certainly in play. The reason we qualified this swim as without a shark cage is because we had no assistance in moving forward faster than my own ability. I just didn't want an asterisk next to my name on this record and a shark cage would have required that asterisk.
</blockquote>
hahahahaha
We're all just carbon, water, starlight, oxygen and dreams
I think I figured out how to get DN to answer your questions. I think you have to resubmit them, but start every question out with
<blockquote>Your story is remarkable</blockquote>
or
<blockquote>you're an inspiration</blockquote>
Seems she responds to questions when they begin with flattery.
We're all just carbon, water, starlight, oxygen and dreams
Another DN obfuscation that continues to perplex me is:
I heard her claim several times, with vim and vigor, on national news circuit shows that
"all the complete evidence (captains logs, observers logs) have been submitted to the appropriate bodies..."
Has anyone seen anything more than the initial, incomplete observer logs?
As I recall, the one male observer posted something incomplete, and the other female observer posted "part 1 of 3" (and a written "summary" of her actual log, strangely) and nothing more.
To watch DN make that bold faced lie and not one of these high profile, so-called journalists do a simple fact check is one the most egregious acts of 'uninspiring' moral/ethical breakdowns I've witnessed in my life!
As a long time redditor like @evmo, I think the later responses to what he and I posted in that thread went far better than expected and were more widely read also. Normally an IAMA is only alive for about 6 hours or read for maybe 10 to 12. Any external analysis of the thread will now show our counter-balancing comments and questions, which was my only purpose when I got there. Thanks to @ColmBreathnach for the heads-up.
@DanSimonelli, you are of course correct, she has repeated those lies about providing proof everywhere and ad nauseum.
@West my favourite question which occurred before we got there, but had been downvoted out of sight because of the celebrity-cult of the reddit IAMA, was "<i>But didn't you cheat?</i>".
Think abut that. That's the result of this forum and everyone here. Random people have heard she's a cheat.
If the author has no mention of the controversy, it's not a good article or a complete picture. I swear that woman will do anything to stay in the press.
OK, finished page one. Took a while. What her last three Cuba-Florida swims that I've followed has done to me is that I feel I have to "fact check" every damn paragraph that these journalists are writing.
We're all just carbon, water, starlight, oxygen and dreams
'...Stoll began to gather information: "Let's figure out the nutrition; let's write to people. But nobody really knows."
What they wanted to do had never been accomplished by anyone, male or female, at any age.'
I guess this New Yorker writer doesn't read the WSJ! Or she may have realized that DN had 'apologized' for her untoward actions against Walter Poenish...oh, and that someone else had swum from Cuba to FL!!
These two publications have sorely disappointed.
Merely "rags" to me now, lacking any real confidence in their journalistic integrity!
You can't take this article seriously. The first sentence breaks my rule that no sentence shall exceed 50 words, (The rule itself is a joke because if a sentence is long enough that you find yourself counting the words, it is too long)
From the summary text under the video on the Motherboard site:
"Before launching into any sport, it's important to know three things: the rules, the stakes, and when to quit. In the case of Diana Nyad, the resolute 64-year-old long-distance swimmer, acknowledging two out of three ain't bad."
That's actually great. There have been some great Nat Geo Adventurer winners. Had Diana Nyad been associated with 2008 overall winner winner Sherpa Pemba Gyalje, I for one would have been sickened and it would have annoyed me far more than most of her stupid self-serving antics.
@loneswimmer, I was refering to the 2014 winner, Kilian Jornet.
"Kilian Jornet, the 2014 People's Choice Adventurer of the Year, is redefining what is possible in the mountains by blurring the lines between trail running and technical climbing. In 2013, the 26-year-old Catalonian set a new speed record running up and down the Matterhorn in two hours and 52 minutes. He also set a record on Mont Blanc. These peaks are part of his four-year Summits of My Life project, in which Jornet will attempt new speed records on the world's most iconic mountains."
“When someone says to me, ‘Are you going to do it again?’, I just shake my head and say, ‘Are you insane? Why would I do that again?’ There are other mountains to climb,” said Nyad. “This one was a 35-year dream, and it’s over. How could you have a better story and a better ending?”
After September 11, I held my tongue. All of the public positions had been taken -- for, against, good, evil. I had nothing more to add. So I thought, Bring in the clowns, you know what I mean? That's why I've done a coupla years' worth of comedies.
-- Jack Nicholson
I pondered posting to this thread again and am ambivalent but my one thought , after seeing Chloe stumble out of the water, face swollen, unsteady to say the least, tearful... was... THAT is what one looks like after 40+ hours in the water.
Having just witnessed Chloe's swim first hand, I can say that i now have a much greater respect for whatever DN did in the water but I aslo feel more disdain for the way it was marketed and misrepresented.
Comments
http://swimswam.com/swimswam-2013-person-or-the-year/
Excerpts:
<blockquote>Diana Nyad's swim, whether legitimate or not, was the biggest newsmaker in swimming of 2013.</blockquote>
<blockquote>This particular... award is not one that specifies ‘good’ or ‘bad’. Much in the mold of Time Magazine, we instead look at who was the biggest news-maker in swimming over the course of 2013, be it for something good or something bad.</blockquote>
<blockquote>The evidence and arguments on both sides are rather convincing, and whenever money’s in play, the motive exists.</blockquote>
<blockquote>It created questions over whether or not a personal profit was to be gained, and if that was enough to cause Nyad to fudge the rules. It created rifts in swimming. It created unity in swimming. </blockquote>
Why the hell would anyone use Bing in the first place?
We're all just carbon, water, starlight, oxygen and dreams
She has recently written a couple of interesting posts on the DN affair:
http://humu-sapiens.blogspot.com/2013/11/wayward-swimmers-paper.html
http://humu-sapiens.blogspot.com/2014/01/diana-v-lance-what-motivates-conformity.html
We're all just carbon, water, starlight, oxygen and dreams
One thing I'm finding out reading marathon swimming historiographies and memoirs is that, during the "golden age" of marathoning competitions, between the '60s and '70s, there seemed to be a strong prevalent notion of the rules, accompanied by a "no big deal" attitude toward them. Penny Dean, when <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Just-Try-More-Penny-Dean/dp/1452584990/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1390494914&sr=8-1&keywords=just+try+one+more">retelling her Golden Gate swim</a> in 1965, says matter-of-factly that she was cold, touched the boat, and was promptly DQ'd. Her discussion of the rules in <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Open-Water-Swimming-Complete-Triathletes/dp/0880117044/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1390494950&sr=1-2">her manual</a> is mostly in the competition context (where they arguably matter more) and she basically concludes as follows: (1) There are rules about not kicking and hitting other swimmers. (2) They are not enforced and people do whatever they want. (3) Since there's no enforcement, you have to learn how to deal with it. (4) Let me teach you some retaliation techniques.
That pretty much sums up any discussion of integrity and rule compliance in the sport in her manual.
Now parsing through <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Open-Water-Swimming-Manual-Triathletes-ebook/dp/B00BH0VSNK/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1390494975&sr=1-1&keywords=lynne+cox+manual">Lynne Cox's manual</a> and <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Wind-Waves-Sunburn-Marathon-Swimming/dp/1558216154/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1390495000&sr=1-1&keywords=wind+waves+sunburn">Conrad Wennerberg's historiography</a>. The latter, interestingly, includes some incredible photographic footage of mythological Middle Eastern distance swimmers from the 40s and 50s (in Egypt and Syria, these marathon swimmers are national heroes, per the book <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Zeitoun-Dave-Eggers-ebook/dp/B0036S4ALS/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1390494880&sr=8-1&keywords=zeitoun">Zeitoun</a>), showing them supported by family and friends with their feet still in the water. Apparently, there was strong conformism to the spirit and ethic of the sport, and people didn't sweat the small stuff.
More to come.
http://humu-sapiens.blogspot.com/2014/01/deviance-social-control-and-swimming.html
Now, to do the write-up. Happy to get comments/questions/insights.
Wonder and awe without the old bearded guy?
I’ll cast my vote for DN on this one.
...anything worth doing is worth overdoing.
This is certainly an example of DN not pandering to the Oprah audience but as the author notes equating atheism and spirituality does indeed seem wishy-washy to some.
...anything worth doing is worth overdoing.
"oh god in which I refuse to believe; why have you forsaken me?"
I tried to convince myself, but, orange flavour electrolyte, mixed with hot chocolate,
tastes nothing like Terry's Chocolate Orange ....
Per what @david_barra asks, as an open water swimmer & atheist, I feel lucky to be able to experience the almost ineffable wonder of the universe and the connection we all feel in the sea, regardless of our credo or lack thereof.
And I do so without once using the word mystical.
loneswimmer.com
no offence intended to atheists anywhere
I tried to convince myself, but, orange flavour electrolyte, mixed with hot chocolate,
tastes nothing like Terry's Chocolate Orange ....
http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1waqka/i_am_the_world_record_swimmer_diana_nyad_ask_me/
Far too late when I saw it, but I've left a response <a href="http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1waqka/i_am_the_world_record_swimmer_diana_nyad_ask_me/cf0yaun">here</a>.
loneswimmer.com
But my favorite question asked of Diana was: "who are you?"
</blockquote>
hahahahaha
We're all just carbon, water, starlight, oxygen and dreams
<blockquote>Your story is remarkable</blockquote>
or
<blockquote>you're an inspiration</blockquote>
Seems she responds to questions when they begin with flattery.
We're all just carbon, water, starlight, oxygen and dreams
I heard her claim several times, with vim and vigor, on national news circuit shows that
"all the complete evidence (captains logs, observers logs) have been submitted to the appropriate bodies..."
Has anyone seen anything more than the initial, incomplete observer logs?
As I recall, the one male observer posted something incomplete, and the other female observer posted "part 1 of 3" (and a written "summary" of her actual log, strangely) and nothing more.
To watch DN make that bold faced lie and not one of these high profile, so-called journalists do a simple fact check is one the most egregious acts of 'uninspiring' moral/ethical breakdowns I've witnessed in my life!
@DanSimonelli, you are of course correct, she has repeated those lies about providing proof everywhere and ad nauseum.
@West my favourite question which occurred before we got there, but had been downvoted out of sight because of the celebrity-cult of the reddit IAMA, was "<i>But didn't you cheat?</i>".
Think abut that. That's the result of this forum and everyone here. Random people have heard she's a cheat.
loneswimmer.com
"...compete at the Olympic level"??? She was a mediocre swimmer at best. Nowhere near what anyone would consider "Olympic level".
<a href="http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2014/02/10/140210fa_fact_levy">"BREAKING THE WAVES: In her sixties, a swimmer revives an old dream."</a>
The author mentions no controversy/questions about the 2013 swim.
-Daniel
the writing of the lives of saints.
Nice 50 cent word.
Can't read the entire article as I don't subscribe to The New Yorker.
http://marathonswimmers.org/assets/nyad/Nyad_NewYorker.pdf
(8.2MB download)
We're all just carbon, water, starlight, oxygen and dreams
We're all just carbon, water, starlight, oxygen and dreams
We're all just carbon, water, starlight, oxygen and dreams
I encourage any forum member who feels inspired to write a Letter to the Editor:
http://www.newyorker.com/contact/contactus
We're all just carbon, water, starlight, oxygen and dreams
We're all just carbon, water, starlight, oxygen and dreams
We're all just carbon, water, starlight, oxygen and dreams
We're all just carbon, water, starlight, oxygen and dreams
What they wanted to do had never been accomplished by anyone, male or female, at any age.'
I guess this New Yorker writer doesn't read the WSJ! Or she may have realized that DN had 'apologized' for her untoward actions against Walter Poenish...oh, and that someone else had swum from Cuba to FL!!
These two publications have sorely disappointed.
Merely "rags" to me now, lacking any real confidence in their journalistic integrity!
You can't take this article seriously. The first sentence breaks my rule that no sentence shall exceed 50 words, (The rule itself is a joke because if a sentence is long enough that you find yourself counting the words, it is too long)
We're all just carbon, water, starlight, oxygen and dreams
"Before launching into any sport, it's important to know three things: the rules, the stakes, and when to quit. In the case of Diana Nyad, the resolute 64-year-old long-distance swimmer, acknowledging two out of three ain't bad."
;-)
loneswimmer.com
"Kilian Jornet, the 2014 People's Choice Adventurer of the Year, is redefining what is possible in the mountains by blurring the lines between trail running and technical climbing. In 2013, the 26-year-old Catalonian set a new speed record running up and down the Matterhorn in two hours and 52 minutes. He also set a record on Mont Blanc. These peaks are part of his four-year Summits of My Life project, in which Jornet will attempt new speed records on the world's most iconic mountains."
loneswimmer.com
http://www.youtube.com/user/DianaNyad/featured
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conch_Republic
-- Jack Nicholson
After Nyad, . . .
And.. that is NOT what Nyad looked like at all.
...anything worth doing is worth overdoing.
Anyone else find it humourous (that's for you Donal) that DN has titled her latest book "Find a Way"?
We're all just carbon, water, starlight, oxygen and dreams