Merle Liivand

Steven Munatones, Courtesy of WOWSA, Huntington Beach, California.

At Redondo Beach, California, Merle Liivand swam along the 10 km course at the WOWSA Ocean Fest, but she choose to do the race as a mermaid swim.

That is, she used a monofin throughout the race.

The rules of mermaid swimming dictated no use of her arms to take a stroke or make any forward progress.

The 10 km world record swim took her 2, hours 54 minutes and 7 seconds in the out-and-back course along Redondo Beach on October 6th 2019.

“I used a normal FINA racing suit and 100% silicone Mermaid Monofin.

I do these swims to raise awareness for the significant microplastics  problem in our oceans,” said Liivand.

The next year, Liivand upped her game and attempted a 20 km mermaid swim in South Point Park Pier in Miami Beach, Florida which she finished in 6 hours, 8 minutes and 27 seconds.

She explained, “This long distance mermaid swim was done without using my arms to take a stroke. I wore a normal FINA racing suit and used a 100% silicone Mermaid Monofin to cover 20.66 km on August 20th, 2020.

Now I am ready to set another record of 30 km following the standard mermaid swim rules.

I want to bring attention to the fact that during the COVID-19 pandemic, there are more face masks in the ocean than ever before.

Plus, this is a fishikilling emergency event in Biscayne Bay. The 30 km attempt will be held on April 17th in Exumas, Bahamas, starting at Peace & Plenty Resort.

I will swim 15 km out and 15 km back to the Peace & Plenty Resort. Owner Steve Harrington has been invaluable to this event.

For this swim, I want to bring attention to the oceans and hope there will be more fish and less plastic in the world’s oceans by 2030.

I am 30 years old and will attempt a 30 km mermaid swim with hopes for improvement by 2030. 30-30-30.”