Camper Completes Grand Circuit Swim in 1:27 - Farm & Wilderness

Anything is possible at Timberlake. Our campers show us this every summer and Jacob Levin is a prime example. Jacob starting on a swim team around the same time he started at Timberlake. He was a “normal” kid at the waterfront jumping off the docks and the rope swing. He saw other campers getting their grand circuit rating and he thought, “swimming around the lake, that’s pretty crazy.”

Jacob thought he’d try a long-distance swim to bear pit to see how that goes. It went well, and two counselors, Dawson Engstrom and Frankie Thatcher took notice. Jacob began training with Dawson and Frankie and completed his first grand circuit in 2016 in 1:40 – a new record for Timberlake. But Jacob wasn’t all that tired after the single grand circuit and his counselors encouraged him to train for a double or a triple Grand Circuit.

“It was always Dawson and Frankie trying to push me to do my best,” says Jacob.

In secret, Jacob had his eye on the impossible – a quadruple grand circuit – an accomplishment we have no record of any another camper completing. In the summer of 2017, Jacob started his day with hot chocolate and an egg sandwich to help fuel what turned out to be a 10.4-mile swim. Let’s say that one more time: a 10.4-mile swim.  When Jacob completed the 10^th mile, he was finally tired, “I could barely talk,” says Jacob. He had the sensation of still being in the water for a while afterward, but he recovered and turned his eye toward his next challenge.  With no more records to break, Jacob challenged his own time.

Jacob returned this past summer to shave 13 minutes off of his grand-circuit swim, completing the 2.6-mile swim in 1:27 (1 hour, 27 minutes).  So, what’s next for Jacob? He’s joining a triathlon team and thinking about being a Counselor Apprentice at Tamarack Farm next summer.

Anything is possible.