Suzanne Heim-Bowen’s Marathon Swim Story
Today’s guest has been marathon swimming for the last 4 decades! I was fortunate to run into Suzanne Heim during one of my online events. Can you believe that she jumped on What is marathon swimming q&a call – just to connect? It was fun to collaborate and point aspiring marathon swimmers in the right direction.
As you can imagine, she has more than a few stories to tell, this is just an overview!
In her own words: I was introduced to the water as a baby with the Mommy and Me classes held at the local YMCA, as a youngster I swam summer league and competed in AAU competitions. At 14, I quit swimming to play boys water polo and run cross country. I helped start the Women’s Swim Team at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo in California. Fearful of the ocean due to a near drowning accident at age 5, I never stepped foot in the ocean until I was 18 years old.
Many swimmers spend their youth focusing on pool swims and later turn to open water swims. For me, it was the opposite. At 19, I joined the San Francisco Dolphin Swimming and Boating Club and completed solo marathon swims as well as racing 25k open water swims as part of the USA National Team. For the next 15 years many of the solo marathon swims (including three English Channel Crossings in 1985 and 1986) were first person swims in San Francisco Bay and several set open water speed records. I then returned to USMS Pool swimming with the focus on pool racing setting World Records in that journey. One of the highlights of my pool swim career, since I still had college eligibility left, was being recruited by the Diablo Valley Community College coach as a distance swimmer at age 50 years old! This was a lot of fun and resulted in a documentary titled, 50 Year Old Freshman and was a multi-awarding winning documentary (movie not just about me!). I returned to marathon solo swimming in 2014 swimming around Manhattan Island—something I had always wanted to do. Once again, I was hooked and became inspired by my South End Rowing and Dolphin Club buddies who were training for incredible marathon swims—Michele Squyer, Cathy Harrington, Raine Pierce, just to name a few swimmers…. seeing them spend time in the water kept me motivated and in 2019 I completed a Round Trip Angel Island and Catalina swim and in 2020 the Length of Lake Tahoe (had to keep myself motivated with a goal to deal with COVID-19).
However, swimming is not my number one passion! It is education of individuals with special needs. Throughout my youth I volunteered in high school to support my peers with special needs in a cooking class, was an assistant in a special education class and an educational therapist while working on my first Master’s degree and received my teaching credentials and taught for 7 years before winning a scholarship to University of Auckland in New Zealand for a year from the Rotary Foundation. I returned from New Zealand and enrolled in another Master’s program and became a school psychologist/ licensed educational psychologist for students with special needs for 18 years, specifically: medically fragile, severe behavior disorder, intellectually delayed, autistic and the last 7 years I was working with youth who were incarcerated: significant mental health needs and post traumatic stress and trauma issues. Thankfully, no matter what was happening in my life…with the challenges of my work…which I love to be challenged, the water was always there to provide peace and that ‘in the present’ time and whatever happened during the day I could turn off the ‘noise’ and focus on my swimming and then return to my work with renewed energy and enthusiasm. I continue to be dedicated to supporting youth with special needs even though ‘retired. I participate on the Juvenile Justice Commission and am an Educational Surrogate/Advocate for youth. My two passions share a symbiotic relationship helping me to be successful in both areas.