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Nyad Completes Cuba-to-Florida Swim Sharks and Nature Cooperate for Solo Cuba-to-Florida Swim
(about 5 hours later)
MIAMI — Her speech slurred and her face red and swollen, Diana Nyad conquered the treacherous Florida Straits on Monday and completed a 53-hour, 110-mile swim from Cuba to Key West. MIAMI — This time, nature tipped its hat, and Diana Nyad finally conquered the 110-mile passage from Cuba to Florida that had bedeviled her for 35 years.
Ms. Nyad, a 64-year-old endurance swimmer, now becomes the only person to have succeeded in swimming from Cuba to Key West without a shark cage. With her final stroke into Smathers Beach in Key West, Ms. Nyad proved that perseverance and big dreams can transcend age and injury. Sharks steered clear, currents were friendly, and storms took most of the Labor Day weekend off.
This was Ms. Nyad’s fifth attempt in 35 years to swim without fins or a wet suit from Cuba to Key West, a daunting journey laden with so many encumbrances, including swarms of jellyfish, that until Monday it seemed impossible to overcome. The 64-year-old endurance swimmer emerged dazed and sunburned from the surf on Smathers Beach in Key West, Fla., just before 2 p.m. on Monday after nearly 53 hours in the ocean, a two-day, two-night swim from her starting point in Havana. She had survived the treacherous Florida Straits, a notorious stretch of water brimming with sharks, jellyfish, squalls and an unpredictable Gulf Stream. And she became the first person to do so unaided by the protection of a shark cage.
Her official time was 52 hours 54 minutes 18.6 seconds, according to her Web site. It was her fifth attempt, coming after four years of grueling training, precision planning and single-minded determination. Her face scorched and puffy from so many hours in the salt water, she leaned on one of her friends and said from the beach:
“I have three messages,” Ms. Nyad, her face scorched and puffy from so many hours in the saltwater, said as she leaned on her best friend. “One is we should never, ever give up. Two is you never are too old to chase your dreams. Three is it looks like a solitary sport but it takes a team.” “I have three messages. One is we should never, ever give up. Two is you never are too old to chase your dreams. Three is it looks like a solitary sport, but it takes a team.”
After two nights and two days of being buffeted by ocean waves, she walked on to Smathers Beach on Monday at 1:20 p.m. to the cheers of onlookers and her 35-member support team. Her team had kept a close watch on Ms. Nyad from five boats that trailed her during the swim. Coming at an age when few people attempt to set endurance records, Ms. Nyad’s swim lit up Twitter and Facebook with postings about perseverance and grit, including a tweet from President Obama: “Congratulations to Diana Nyad. Never give up on your dreams.”
Millions more exhilarated in her age-defying feat from afar, on Twitter and Facebook, viewing it with inspiration and pride. Ms. Nyad’s success was built on her failures — the first in 1978, when she was 28, and the most recent last year at age 62. After each attempt, she improvised, learning what to adjust, whom to consult and which new protective protocol to consider. “Diana did her homework,” said Bonnie Stoll, Ms. Nyad’s friend and chief handler, shortly after Ms. Nyad completed her swim.
One of the first to send a message on Twitter was President Obama: “Congratulations to Diana Nyad. Never give up on your dreams.” Two summers ago, she was felled midswim by a long asthma attack, her first ever. This year, she added a pulmonologist to her 35-member support team, Ms. Stoll said.
The ocean between Florida and Cuba is a notoriously fierce opponent, brimming with sharks, jellyfish, squalls and an uncompromising Gulf Stream current. Box jellyfish, which are especially venomous, have been a constant source of danger; Ms. Nyad has been stung so badly on previous swims she had to stop. To break that cycle, she found an expert on box jellyfish this year to help her contain the threat.
Last year, Ms. Nyad was defeated by all three. She was forced back on to the boat after storms knocked her off track, sharks menaced her and she was badly stung by box jellyfish. In 2011, her shoulder injured, she suffered her first asthma attack in the water and began to vomit, a turn of events that forced her to stop. In the evenings, Ms. Nyad donned a special suit with long sleeves and pant legs to protect her. She slathered “sting stopper” gel to form a barrier to keep out the venom. On Saturday night, she also wore a specially made prosthetic mask that covered her face. But the mask proved uncomfortable, cutting her mouth and tongue so badly, and impeding her breathing, that she discarded it after the first night.
Each time Ms. Nyad vowed it would be her last. But she could not help herself. The swim across the Straits was her personal quest, one that until Monday seemed Quixotic, at best, and fatuous, at worst. The course was mostly clear of box jellyfish this time. When she finally encountered a cluster, it was on her approach to Key West. The shark divers swam ahead of Ms. Nyad to disperse the swarm.
But this year nature tipped its hat. In 2011, Ms. Nyad decided to use a team of shark divers who carried special zappers to ward off the predators. Trial and error also presented new options. She learned which wet suits were more forgiving on her skin in saltwater and which special nutrition gels and liquid drinks best fueled her. (She ingested them, sometimes through a tube, while treading water.) But there were two things Ms. Nyad could not control: the weather and the current. This time, both cooperated.
Sharks steered clear, the swift current carried her along and storms took the Labor Day weekend off. Even the box jellyfish cooperated, although she was well prepared for their challenge. She wore a jelly protection suit and a mask to protect her face from their poison. Her body was coated with “sting stopper” gel to serve as a barrier from the venom. When she encountered box jellyfish near Key West, Ms. Nyad’s divers swam ahead of her this year to disperse them. “I think that Mother Nature said, ‘You know what? Let her go,’ ” Ms. Stoll said.
“I think that Mother Nature said: ‘You know what? Let her go,’ ” said Bonnie Stoll, one of her closest friends. “Diana also did her homework.” Unlike past swims derailed by squalls that pushed her off course, only one storm hit this weekend. It came on Sunday night and lasted a little under 90 minutes, Ms. Stoll said. Ms. Nyad followed her protocol and swam through it, accompanied by shark divers.
To stay focused, Ms. Nyad did what she always does: she hummed her favorite songs in her head. Her strokes were calibrated to the cadence of the Beatles’ “Ticket to Ride” and “Paperback Writer” to name two. Sharks, always a menace, were nowhere to be seen this time.
The favorable currents carried her along so swiftly that Ms. Nyad finished her swim one day earlier than expected, Ms. Stoll said. On average, Ms. Nyad swims about 1.6 miles an hour. With the current propelling her, she cruised at 5 m.p.h. during one stretch, Ms. Stoll said, adding,
“Everything was in our favor.” To help her focus, Ms. Nyad relied, as she always has, on her favorite songs. Over and over, she hums them in her head, her strokes falling perfectly in time with the music’s cadence: “Ticket to Ride” by The Beatles echoed on one stretch, “Paperback Writer” on another.
The melodies keep her in rhythm; they keep her sane.
“Swimming is the ultimate form of sensory deprivation,” Ms. Nyad said in the month before her 2011 swim. “You are left alone with your thoughts in a much more severe way.”
Through the years, others have tried to swim from Cuba to Key West and failed. In June, the Australian swimmer Chloe McCardel swam 11 hours and 14 miles before jellyfish stings forced her to stop.
In 2012, another Australian swimmer, Penny Palfrey, swam 79 miles until strong currents waylaid her. In 1978, Walter Poenisch, an Ohio man, said he made the swim using flippers and a snorkel, but he lacked independent documentation to verify it.
Susie Maroney did complete the swim in 1997, but she did so inside a shark cage that was being pulled by a boat, providing a draft that made swimming much easier. The first time Ms. Nyad attempted the swim, in 1978, she also used a shark cage. Ms. Nyad did not use a shark cage this time. Whenever Ms. Nyad scrambled, heartbroken and exhausted, onto a boat after a failed attempt, she vowed it would be her last. “It was a fairy tale,” she said after her second failed attempt in August 2011, “but the fairy tale didn’t come true.”
After last summer, Ms. Stoll said she was convinced that the Florida Straits were unswimmable. “I thought it wasn’t humanly possible or she would have done it,” Ms. Stoll said. “I was glad to be wrong.”

This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: September 2, 2013

An earlier version of this story incorrectly stated the time of Diana Nyad’s arrival from Cuba on a beach in Key West, Fla. The swimmer arrived just before 2 p.m. on Monday, not at 1:20 p.m.