On Monday 30 June at 11pm Birkirkara St Joseph’s long distance swimmer Keith Bartolo, above, wrote down his name among the world’s best open water swimmers, when, together with a team of five British swimmers he broke the world record for the longest lake swim in the world – Lake Winderemere in the Lake District in England.

The team of hand-picked long distance swimmers lined-up with Dee Llewellyn, Thomas Noblett, Leanne Llewellyn, Michelle Sharples, Michelle Lefton and Keith Bartolo.

The prevailing water temperatures, ranging from 9 degrees to 12 degrees Celsius, coupled with gusts of wind at times blowing at 35 knots per hour, made life very difficult for this team of great swimmers, who bravely took on the distance of 202 kilometres head on and finished their swim in a world record time of 75 hours 32 minutes, smashing the previous one, held by a team of American/ Mexican hall of fame swimmers.

What made this world record even special is the huge effort of the swimmers and the dedication their support crew showed, without whose help such an epic and unique swim would never have materialised into such a success, and for it to go down in the annals of long distance swimming.

In a statement, Birkirkara St Joseph Sports Club congratulated their swimmer for such a huge achievement. The club is also grateful for the assistance it has received in supporting Keith Bartolo in his long distance swimming endeavours, particularly his planned crossing of the English Channel in two years time.