Neil Agius, Sharon van Rouwendaal Honored at WOWSA Awards
The World Open Water Swimming Association unveiled the 2024 WOWSA Awards this week, honoring the best in open-water swimming across six categories.
Malta’s Neil Agius earned runner-up for Man of the Year and won the Performance of the Year Award. Sharon van Rouwendaal won Woman of the Year after her second Olympic marathon swim gold medal. Also honored was the Disney movie, Young Woman and the Sea, which was named the Product/Service of the Year.
Bulgaria’s Petar Stoychev won Man of the Year for setting the fastest cumulative time for the Triple Crown of Open Water Swimming (22 hours, 8 minutes, 46 seconds), more than two hours quicker than the roster. Stoychev completed the Oceans Seven challenge in 173 days.
Agius’ honors were for his world record for the longest unassisted, current-neutral ocean swim, which covered 142.3 kilometers in 60 hours, 35 minutes, 4 seconds around Malta and Gozo.
Third for Man of the Year and Second for Performance of the Year was Brian Foster of Ireland, the youngest person to swim the North Channel in a two-way crossing lasting 24 hours, 50 minutes, 13 seconds.
Van Rouwendaal had a massively successful year. She won the 10-kilometer swim at the Paris Olympics, her second gold medal after winning the Rio race in 2016 to go with silver in Tokyo in 2021. Van Rouwendaal also won the 5-kilometer and 10-kilometer races at the 2024 World Aquatics Championships in Doha, taking her to 10 career Worlds medals.
Melanie Barratt of the United Kingdom won second place for Woman of the Year and Adaptive Performance of the Year. She became the first blind woman to swim the English Channel, completing a crossing in 12 hours, 20 minutes. Third for Woman of the Year and in Performance of the Year was American Amy Appelhans Gubser, who became the first person to swim the 29.7 miles from the Golden Gate Bridge to the Farallon Islands.
The Adaptive Performance of the Year went to Jiya Rai, a 16-year-old from India who became the first girl with autism spectrum disorder to swim the English Channel (17 hours, 25 minutes). Third place went to Jonty Warenken, a 52-year-old British amputee who was the first para-athlete to complete a solo circumnavigation of the island of Jersey (56 kilometers; 11 hours, 33 minutes).
The UK’s UltraSwim 33.3 is the Event of the Year, a multi-stage event mimicking the 33.3 kilometers that is the English Channel crossing set in locations across Europe. Second was the 27-kilometer Batalla de Rande in Spain, while the Port to Pub race from North Fremantle to Rottnest Island, Australia, finished third.
Young Woman and the Sea, the Gertrude Ederle biopic produced by Disney and starring Daisy Ridley, was named the Product/Service of the Year.
Second place went to the Julian Critchlow English Channel Database, a comprehensive documenting of Channel swims dating from 1875. Third went to Ram Barkai’s Ice Swimming Expedition to Antarctica, which included 12 swimmers under the auspices of the International Ice Swimming Association.
WOWSA, which provides a platform and global support for open water swimming, culled its winners from 60 finalists hailing form 24 countries. A total of 177 candidates were nominated for the awards.
“The WOWSA Awards honor the extraordinary individuals whose dedication and resilience shape the global open water swimming community,” WOWSA Executive Director Quinn Fitzgerald said in a press release. “These nominees have made a profound impact on the sport, and we are privileged to celebrate them as true ambassadors of open water swimming.”
The WOWSA Awards are sponsored by Hasty Awards. The voting was conducted by a weighted voting system, with a public vote of more than 6,000 responses accounting for 25 percent of the score and the WOWSA Voting Academy’s 83-member board counting for 75 percent. The full voting is available on WOWSA’s website.
2024 WOWSA Awards
Man of Year
- First place: Petar Stoychev, Bulgaria
- Second place: Neil Agius, Malta
- Third place: Brian Foster, Ireland
Woman of the Year
- First place: Sharon van Rouwendaal, Netherlands
- Second place: Melanie Barratt, United Kingdom
- Third place: Amy Applehans Gubser, United States
Performance of the Year
- First place: Neil Agius, Malta
- Second place: Brian Foster, Ireland
- Third place: Amy Applehans Gubser, United States
Adaptive Performance of the Year
- First place: Jiya Rai, India
- Second place: Melanie Barratt, United Kingdom
- Third place: Jonty Warneken, United Kingdom
Event of the Year
- First place: UltraSwim 33.3, United Kingdom
- Second place: Batalla de Rande, Spain
- Third place: Port to Pub, Australia
Product/Service of the Year
- First place: Young Woman and the Sea, United States
- Second place: Julia Critchlow English Channel Database, United Kingdom
- Third place: Ice Swimming Adventure Expedition to Antarctica, South Africa
