Man completes Catalina swim

Newport Beach Lifeguard John Graass completed his first swim from the Santa Catalina Island to Palos Verdes.

At 11:30 p.m. Saturday, Graass stepped into 71-degree water and started his swim on a ridiculously stuffed stomach, he said.

“I was pretty full from a big dinner of pasta to make sure I had plenty of energy when I started,” Graass said, adding chugging eight ounces of Gatorade every 20 minutes didn’t help.

Even with the warm waters after a few hours had passed, Graass felt the heat slowly being sapped from his extremities.

By the sixth hour, Graass felt the first stings of hypothermia set in.

Graass kept going, and four hours later he saw the shores of his destination, which appeared much closer than they actually were, he said.

But the Newport Beach resident’s persistence paid off as he splashed into the beach of Palos Verdes’ Point Vicente after a total of 10 hours and 32 minutes, becoming the 136th swimmer to cross the channel in a Catalina Channel Swimming Federation-sanctioned swim.

Graass has no future plans to revisit the experience in any waters. “Everyone was talking about maybe doing the English Channel, I don’t’ know,” Grass said. “I think I will be content with Catalina.”

— Kelly Strodl