The Monheim’s
ALCATRAZ (1.5 mi)
Such a cool and iconic swim! This really birthed my love for swimming in cold open water. Unfortunately this race was a duathlon, Swim and Run. Talk about 7 miles of running torture, get me back in the water!
Here is my beautiful wife, Krysalea, daughters Sadie & Ella Jane (middle), son Josiah John and we are The Monheims. We are a family devoted to adventure and living life to its fullest.
How it all began
When I jumped off that ferry boat into the icy cold San Francisco Bay, the open ocean had me hooked. We are The Monheims and here is a brief story of how we got here. August 2016 I (victor) swam the escape from Alcatraz swim and loved it! Fast-forward June 2017, I found myself swimming around the island of Key West in the warm salty waters with my sisters at my side in the kayak, my wife, daughter, and Dad cheering from the beach, and many others cheering from afar! Key West sealed the deal for us. The amount of fun we had as a family and the joy in success I experienced personally was something we were not going to let go as a family, we would do something like this again, and soon! The Ocean 7 was it.
We decided the Catalina Channel in California would be the best channel to start, mostly because it was in the states. The more I researched and planned, the more I realized I wanted someone else to share in the joy and reward that we were going to experience, someone who needed joy desperately. Then I was introduced to The Aruna Project in October 2018.
KEY WEST ISLAND SWIM (12.5 mi)
Incredible swim, but even better experience with my family! My sisters were my support kayak crew and my wife and Sadie Bug along with my Dad were my on land cheerleaders! I was so pleased with my swim here, but I knew there was more in me…lots more!
My wife had signed us up to do an Aruna 5k Run for Her run in downtown Cincinnati. Aruna had set up a live video chat with some of the women apart of the Aruna Project in India, we could see them right then right there before the race, it was incredible! I was able to look Priya in the eyes and say, “I am running for you, Priya!” ‘
I knew who I was going to swim for, I was going to swim for women like Priya, I was going to swim for HER.
Here the Swim for Her campaign was born.
