A nine-year-old Chinese girl has become the youngest person to swim across a strait linking the island province of Hainan with the mainland.
Zhou Yihan, who learned how to swim when she was just a year old, took 13 hours to make the 26km crossing of the Qiongzhou Strait- known as the "Everest of the Seas" last week, starting from Haikou, the capital of Hainan, and finished in Xuwen in Guangdong province.
The girl, a third-grade pupil from Guangzhou, set out with nine adult swimmers at 5.40am last Wednesday, only three of whom were able to complete the full crossing.
Yihan had to overcome repeated jellyfish attacks and strong currents that delayed her arrival.
The girl was inspired by her father who successfully completed the challenge last year with his daughter traveling alongside him on a support vessel.
"I thought it was fun. I wanted to do it like him," she said.
To prepare for the voyage, she spent six days a week training in a local swimming pool with her father and a professional coaching her.
Yihan, like the others taking part in the challenge, had a support boat alongside her, and her parents and coach travelled on board to offer support.
Individual swimmers were not allowed to climb on board these vessels and had to rest, eat and drink in the sea to complete the crossing successfully, although four of the adult swimmers took part in a relaying, each swimming for an hour at a time. Two others were unable to complete the crossing.
"I was bitten by a jellyfish when I was less than 1km away from the starting point. [I was bitten] more than 20 times, and I was a little worried. My coach and father took turns to swim in front of me to drive away from the jellyfish," she recalled.
"When the sea got rough halfway the waves kept me at the same point. I couldn't move forward for quite a long time. My father was worried and asked me to get on board, but I didn't want to quit. I wanted to keep going on," she said.
She missed the planned landing point due to a strong current and arrived later than expected.
It took her father eight hours to finish the journey last year, and he had previously expected her to take about 11 hours to finish the crossing.
Her father had previously told Yangcheng Evening News that he had not encouraged his daughter to undertake the challenge, but once she had made up her mind to do it he and her mother had offered their full support.
Unlike many Chinese parents whose primary concern is their children's academic performance, he said he did not want to put too much pressure on her at such a young age.
Source: SCMP
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