2010 Kapiti Island to Mainland Swim

The top two swimmers in the Kapiti Island to Mainland Swim both set records this year.

Casey Glover

Winner Casey Glover, of Lower Hutt, set a race record of 1:07:08:53.

And runner-up Stephenie Bennington, of Wellington – last year’s winner – set

a women’s record and a personal best, cutting 22 minutes off  her time last year.

The Kapiti Coast turned on the weather with a magnificent day on Saturday for the swim.

There were 15 swimmers, with two in particular going for the cup — Casey Glover and Stephanie Bennington.

This year the race started a little earlier than in previous years, with relatively calm conditions but a cooler water temperature of just 16 °.

After 30 minutes, a thick sea fog descended from the north and south making visibility difficult for the swimmers and accompanying boat crews.

Stephenie Bennington

However, this didn’t affect Glover, and by the halfway point he had opened up a considerable gap over Bennington and finally reached the finish line in a record time.

Bennington emerged in second place with a personal best also the new women’s record.

Adam Dyhrberg, 15, came home in third place. He’s the first local swimmer from the Raumati Swimming club to get a placing for a number of years and his time was 1hour 32 mins. It was his first long-distance race.

The first swimmer pulled out some 30 minutes into the race. And a veteran swimmer who has competed for over 40 years, Ray Gough, 67, didn’t manage to complete this year’s swim.

Adam Dyhrberg

Casey Glover has been doing competitive swimming for over 15 years now, and also holds the record for the fastest crossing across Cook Strait.

He’s heading to Melbourne to compete in the Australian open water 10kms event in 2 weeks time.

First time competitor from Germany, Matyas Nagy, 18 years old had only been in New Zealand for two weeks. He’s staying in Raumati South and decided on the spur of the moment to have a go.

Mr Nagy says, “I have never swum in the sea competively before, I have only done pool training so this was an experience for me.”

And, he adds, “I haven’t done a lot of training in recent weeks.”

Matyas Nagy

After struggling at times during the race trying to combat the cold , Nagy eventually crossed the finish line in a credible 9^th place.

The first male/female veteran swimmers to cross the line were Leon De Villers and Juliet Mollan.

The Wellington Free Ambulance offered their support to the event by supplying 2 medic aids.