Marathon Swimming Conspiracy Theorists Say Diana Nyad's Swim From Cuba To Florida Was Fake

Business Insider – Some hardcore marathon swimmers are questioning the validity of Diana Nyad’s historic swim from Havana, Cuba to Key West, Florida last week. The accusations range from petty (she had someone help her eat) to serious (she got on the boat at one point), and they’re popping up on various swimming forums online. Nyad, age 64, is the first person to ever make the 110-mile swim unaided.

Here’s what the skeptics are saying:

• It’s strange that Nyad didn’t have someone continuously film the entire 53-hour swim
• There was no independent news media following the entire race, which there were during her past attempts
• There was a spike in her swim speed in the middle part of the race, and then a return to her normal pace at the end — which some are speculating means she got on the boat
• The two independent observers on her support boat knew Nyad

Nyad maintains that she didn’t cheat, and swam every stroke of the 110 miles. Her team says she got a boost from a rare, once-a-month current that peaked at 4 miles per hour during the swim’s second day — which accounts for the spike in speed that her critics find skeptical. A scientist told the New York Times that this explanation makes sense, and that she hit the current at the exact right time. Most of the other criticisms from Nyad’s skeptics have to do with marathon swimming etiquette. A forum on MarathonSwimmers.org is filled with complaints about how much help Nyad was getting during her swim. Commenters say that the fact that handlers helped Nyad eat and apply cream cheapen her accomplishment. In addition, her wetsuit and jellyfish mask wouldn’t have been allowed under English Channel swimming rules, though Nyad never said she was going to follow those rules.

The nerve of this bitch. You gotta get up pretty early in the morning to pull the old “I Swam 110 Miles” wool over my eyes.

I promise it was real! Check the video tape! Just ignore parts where we weren’t filming, I totally promise I was still swimming though. And the parts where I sped up to the exact speed of a small boat was just because of the special once a month current. If you don’t believe me you can ask my two best friends, they’ll tell you the truth.

Get out of my face you lying, pruney, waterlogged bitch. You couldn’t stomach the idea of giving up a 5th time so you got in the boat. Just admit it. There’s no shame in saying you couldn’t swim from fucking Cuba to Florida. The only people who can do that are the ones who are defecting and fleeing an oppressive dictatorship. An old white bitch doing it just to be able to say she did it ain’t gonna cut it. You broke all the rules to begin with, and you took a boat for like 20 miles. Admit what you did you deceitful asshole.