Oakville man swims across Lake Ontario in 24 hours

Lake Ontario is considered one of the toughest open swims in the world, due to its varying temperatures and unpredictable winds and currents. Every summer, a handful of swimmers try to cross it.

This weekend, after 10 months of training, Oakville adventurer Madhu Nagaraja successfully swam the 41.2 kilometres from Port Dalhousie to Oakville's Coronation Park in just over 24 hours.

His swim was chronicled by the official L.O.S.T. Swimming (Lake Ontario Swim Team) blog, which reported the swimmer to be in "ridiculously good shape after finishing."

Twelve crew members, including a coach, navigator, doctor and three pacers, followed him by boat and took turns swimming alongside Nagaraja.

"He's got a strong will. He sets a goal and he does it," Doug Harrison, a land crew member of Nagaraja's, told the Toronto Star.

Nagaraja's safe arrival at Coronation Park at 9:37 pm on Sunday made Nagaraja the 50th person to complete the challenging swim across Lake Ontario since Marilyn Bell's historical swim in 1954, and the second swimmer to use that exact route. Melanie Price pioneered the L.O.S.T. route last year, crossing in just over 18 hours.

In 2004, Nagaraja crossed the English Channel in 12 hours, 31 minutes. He's now one of just 12 swimmers to have crossed both the English Channel and Lake Ontario.