Courtesy: Swim Across America
Like many others, Michael Phelps had a fear of the water as a young child. However, that didn’t deter Cathy Bennett from helping Michael develop comfort and confidence in the water. Now, as Bennett battles cancer for the second time, Phelps is diving into the water again to headline a Swim Across America charity event on Wednesday, Aug. 28, to honor his good friend with proceeds from the charity swim to benefit cancer research.
Bennett, whom Phelps affectionately refers to as Ms. Cathy, is the Program Director of the Michael Phelps Foundation where she oversees the Foundation’s signature program – IM – which provides learn-to-swim, recreational aquatic activities, organized swim instruction, as well as health, wellness, and goal-setting programming.
“Ms. Cathy and her family mean so much to me, my family, the Foundation, and countless others in the swimming community and I wanted to honor her with this charity swim,” said Phelps. “Ms. Cathy has never been one to seek any kind of attention, but raising awareness with Swim Across America to benefit cancer research will hopefully help find a cure for all forms of cancer.”
Phelps, the most decorated swimmer in World Championships history and 28-time Olympic medalist, retired from competitive swimming in 2016. The proceeds from the charity swim will benefit the Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, MD.
Since 1987, Swim Across America has granted nearly $100 million to fund cancer research at Johns Hopkins, Memorial Sloan Kettering, MD Anderson and other institutions.
When: Wednesday, August 28, 5pm to 7pm
Where: Kino Aquatic Center in Mesa, Arizona
Register: The charity swim is limited to 50 participants.
Each participant must donate or raise a minimum of $1,000
Website: swimacrossamerica.org/SAAPhelpsSwim
Notable Attendees: Dr. Bill Nelson chief of the Kimmel Cancer Center at Johns Hopkins, three-time Olympian Allison Schmitt (2008, 2012, 2016), 2016 Olympic head coach and Arizona State University head coach Bob Bowman, and members of the ASU swim team are anticipated to attend the charity swim as we celebrate Cathy.
About Swim Across America
Swim Across America is dedicated to raising money and awareness for cancer research and clinical trials through swimming-related charity events. Created in 1987, SAA has granted close to $100 million that has led to new cancer cures in immunotherapy, breakthroughs in new screening and detection methods, and helped pioneer personalized medicine. For more information, visit www.swimacrossamerica.org.
Connect with Swim Across America on Social:
Instagram: saaswim
Facebook: swimacrossamerica
LinkedIn: swim-across-america-inc
missed seeing phelp’s name in the articles
He has 400im for a few more years until Carson Foster breaks it
Didn’t Foster just swim a 4:13 or 4:11? Either way a 8-10 second drop in a few years is a lot to put on the young man, but would be interesting to see.
For an extra $1000, will Michael Phelps let me beat him? That would be a good story to come back to the office with…
Phelps should come back and swim 200 free and 200 IM and 4 x 200 FR. In my opinion, those are the weakest events. Might only take a 1:44 and 1:55 to win
“only”
I think a 1:55 is in range if he had been training, but that 1:44 would be tough. He couldn’t get out of the pool after the 200 in Rio.
It’s sad that we are forced to host charity events for cancer research because the government’s not doing enough.
It’s unbeliveable that Mr pianos post has so many negative votes. It’s basic common sense that a lot of governments(especially the USA) aren’t doing as much as they can for cancer. Basic logic shows that big pharma makes to much money on treatments and medication to help find cures.
Sorry, but this is just incorrect. Coming from someone who double majored in the biomedical eng. and economics, the US has one of the best funding for Cancer’s R&D both from the public and private sector. A factor why cancer survival rates in the states is one of the highest in the world. A simple look up will lead you to a lot of studies about this. Even with a lot of funding (cancer is one of the most funded and researched in the medical field) “curing”/treating types of cancer is easier said than done since cancer cell heterogeneity pose a great obstacle to us, don’t get me wrong funding helps but throwing money only goes so far. Progression through… Read more »
NGUYEN009 makes some good points and with all the funding we pour into cancer research we haven’t made as much progress as we should. Government isn’t the solution but rather the problem in that they slow down the process and big pharma is all about the treatment and not cure of diseases in general.
Love the support, but the treatment still seems to be blasting the patient with chemo and hope you get it early enough to have a chance to remove it or put it into remission.
I’d pay $1000 to see Phelps race Dressel in the 50m fly. Would Dressel beat him by more than 3 whole seconds at this point?
As long as he’s not vs. a shark
That Phelps vs shark thing was the dumbest thing I have ever seen
I’d love to see a 200 fly
iSsA cOmEbAcK iN dIsGuIsE
tOkYo 2020 cOmEbAcK?!?!
No.
No and Tokyo is already 11month away. Lochte can try made fifth Olympic team.