California teen swimmer Maya Merhige is making waves in sports history books. The 16-year-old is among the list of youngest swimmers in history to accomplish the prestigious Triple Crown of Open Water Swimming.
Those who achieve the Triple Crown of Open Water Swimming honor are those who are successful in completing major swims: swimming the English Channel, and Catalina Channel, and swimming around Manhattan.
The English Channel consists of 20.5 miles between England and France. The Catalina Channel includes 20 miles between Santa Catalina Island and the California mainland. Finally, the challenge of swimming around Manhattan entails 28.5 miles around Manhattan Island in New York City in what is referred to as the Manhattan 20 Bridges swim.
Merhige successfully swam the English Channel on July 13 in 11 hours and 39 minutes. The Berkeley, California teen is no stranger to setting records. She broke the record as the youngest woman in history to successfully swim the 20-mile Catalina Channel, finishing in 10 hours and 48 minutes in 2011. She was 14 years old.
Then a year later, Merhige was one of the youngest swimmers to complete the 20 Bridges swim around Manhattan. She finished the swim in 8 hours and 43 minutes.
Part of Merhige’s crew was Kelly Gentry, an accomplished swimmer of the English Channel.
The first thing the 16-year-old did when she finished swimming the English Channel? She ate Chow Mien, one of her favorite meals.
16-year-old Maya Merhige back on the boat after successfully swimming the English Channel on July 13, 2024, in 11 hours and 39 minutes.
“The English Channel was cold and the current was really strong,” Merhige said. “I knew I had to keep swimming hard, no matter how exhausted I was, in order to get past the tidal current.”
The newly Triple Crown of Open Water Swimming athlete completed the marathon swims to raise funds for Swim Across America, a nonprofit that funds clinical trials and treatments for cancer. And the cause is close to her heart. Doctors found a benign tumor on her pancreas last year following medical care after a ski accident.
Hospitalization meant a loss in training and looming doubt that she would be able to complete her goal. Yet, the teen swimmer preserved, swimming through stomach pain and schools of jellyfish. To get her through the discomfort, she thought of the kids who are faced with the challenges of a cancer diagnosis and pushed through.
Merge began swimming with Swim Across America San Francisco at age nine in honor of a friend who is a cancer survivor. She currently serves as president of the Swim Across America – San Francisco Junior Advisory Board. She has a goal to raise $35,000 this year.
Merhige set the goal to participate in the San Francisco open water swim on October 5, 2024, to continue to raise money for the nonprofit.