Cox’s Bazar beach in Bangladesh is the longest natural sandy beach in the world. It’s more than 120km long! And the ONLY lifeguarding service provided along its stretch is the SEASAFE project, provided by TAGS partners, CIPRB and RNLI.

Chairman Mao was a keen swimmer. On 16 July 1966 in his early-70s, he swam in China’s Yangtze river to show he was still in robust physical health. The event is still commemorated in China by swimming enthusiasts.

The Calcutta Swimming Club, founded in 1898, is the oldest swimming club in Asia – and possibly the world. TAGS Malini Mehra swam the first-ever 10km swim in its pool on 25 March 2018.

American Diane Nyad (64) is the first person to swim the dangerous Cuba to Florida strait without a shark cage. Nyad completed the 110-mile long swim from Havana to Key West in 53 hours in 2013 on her 5th attempt.

Swimming first became an Olympic event in 1896. At first, it was only open to men. Women had to wait another 16 years to be allowed to participate in 1912. The photo shows the gold medal-winning UK women’s swimming team at the 1912 Stockholm Olympics.

India’s Madhavi Latha is a 45-year old Paralympic swimming champ who set up the Yes We Too Can Do trust to encourage people with disabilities to take up sports.

There are no required courses at Williams College (USA), except physical education. And the ONLY skill required for graduation is the ability to swim!
https://athletics.williams.edu/physical-education/requirements-swim-test/

An Olympic size pool depending on its size (50 meters X 25 yards or meters) – like this one in Dhaka, Bangladesh – can hold from 700,000 to 850,000 gallons of water.

The oldest form of stroke used is the breaststroke. It is found in drawings of people swimming from Ancient Egypt dating back to 2500 BC. It is also the slowest stroke in the Olympics.

Swimming is the best all-round exercise. It works all the body’s major muscles, strengthens heart and lungs, reduces stress and burns up more calories than walking or biking. And you can do it at any age!

Elephants can swim up to 20 miles a day using their trunks to breathe through. This group of Elephant mermaids is swimming in the Andaman & Nicobar islands.

The legendary women free divers of Jeju island in South Korea are called haenyeo. For centuries, the haenyeo have worked in the sea diving for creatures & treasures to sell in the markets. At their height, there were 23,000 haenyeo women on Jeju. The tradition is dying out, but many active haenyo can still be found in their 70’s and 80’s on Jeju.

Swimmers have worn all sorts of protective eye goggles over the years. In 14th century Persia, pearl divers used to make them from tortoise shells. The first modern rubber goggles were made in the 1930’s in the USA.

The first woman to cross the English Channel (21 miles) was also the fastest person ever. In 1926, the American swimming prodigy, Gertrude Ederle crossed the Channel in 14 hours and 31 mins. She beat the best men’s time and became only the sixth person – and first woman – to swim the Channel. She was only 19. She was also the first to swim using the new front crawl stroke (aka freestyle) and wearing a full face mask (improvised motorbike goggles sealed with paraffin wax).

Ironically, the Bikini got its name from Bikini Atoll – the atoll in the Marshall Islands in the south Pacific, which the US govt used as a nuclear testing site for 23 explosions in the 1940s.