GARDEN CITY – A 21-year-old Mendon man swam the length of Bear Lake Saturday, a 17-mile swim in one day.
Brayden Jarrett began his swim at 7:04 a.m. at Rendezvous Beach just as the sun was rising and finished at North Beach at 6:08 p.m.
Jerrett said he had been swimming since he was just a little kid. All his five siblings swam at Mountain Crest High School and, being the youngest, would follow them to the pool.
He said he is the only one in the family that still swims on a regular basis.
“The past year I’ve started to enjoy open water swimming,” he said. ”In 2022 I swam the 10K, the width of Bear Lake, and after that I decided to set my sights on swimming the English Channel.”
Jerrett found Gordon Gridley, a man who had already swam the English Channel, and the two began working towards that goal.
“When I’m training, I swim four to five miles a day,” he said. “I’m only 5’10” and not very athletic.”
“Gordon gave me the idea of swimming the length of Bear Lake for training,” Jerrett added. “He said it would be good practice.”
He plans to swim in the cold water around Alcatraz and Angel Island in November. Jerrett needs to swim six hours around Alcatraz, which will have cold enough water to qualify him to swim next year.
The qualification requires a 6-hour continuous swim in water that is 61 degrees or colder.
“The water around Alcatraz is salt water, with a current and is cold like the English Channel,” the Utah State University Accounting major said. “That swim will be closer to the miles I need for the English Channel swim.”
Gridley said on Saturday the conditions were favorable the entire first half of the swim and gnarly in the middle for about 30 minutes or so. After the 30 minutes it cleared back up to be sunny with relatively smooth conditions.
“As the observer, I was extremely impressed with his technique,” he said. “He has really long and controlled freestyle.”
Based on his strokes per minute, which Gridley measured every 30 minutes, Jerrett’s total strokes for this swim were approximately 29,532 strokes in just over 11 hours of swimming.
“Jerrett became the ninth person to ever swim the entire length of Bear Lake,” Gridley said. “This is a great achievement and milestone in his quest to swim the English Channel in June of 2027.”