Matthias Kaßner Talks About Berlin Köpenick Marathon Swim
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52-year-old Matthias Kaßner from Germany has achieved the Triple Crown of Open Water Swimming, an Ice Mile, and completed five Oceans Seven channels to date.
Kaßner was scheduled to attempt his sixth Oceans Seven channel – the Molokai Channel – this summer, but had to cancel it due to the COVID-19 pandemic. So he attempted the 30 km Berlin Köpenick Marathon Swim that had never been done before. He explained the swim – completed on August 28th – on today’s edition of WOWSA Live.
Kaßner explains, “The beauty of the swim lies in the variety of landscapes and in the different bodies of water. You swim through canals in forests, in rivers along village communities (New Venice), across a vast lake, through the old town of Köpenick with its castle and along deserted factory ruins.
The swim itself is beautiful, but there were many obstacles for me. I got sick very early in the swim and it lasted until the end. I really had to dig deep to continue. After a few hours in the swim, we had to deal with a rope in the propeller of the boat and a lost feeding bottle. There was no replacement on the boat. We had to deal with much boat traffic from ferries to sailing boats and motorboats.
After three quarter of the swim, our boat engine broke down and we had to organize a second boat to continue the swim. With the replacement boat (the crew had to switch boats in the water as I continued to swim), we finished the swim on a small beach in a village called Schmöckwitz where it started 13 hours 7 minutes before .”
Kaßner previously discussed his career and his passion for open water swimming since his early days on WOWSA Live where he first discussed the Berlin circumnavigation:
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