Bhakti Sharma is an Indian swimmer, and an open water swimmer who is regarded as one of the first Asian woman and the youngest in the world. She has set record in the open water swimming in the cold waters of Antarctic Ocean.
Early Life of Bhakti Sharma
Bhakti Sharma is an Indian swimmer who was born on 30th November in the year 1989. He is an Indian Open water swimmer. Bhakti Sharma was born in Mumbai, Maharashtra and brought up in Udaipur, Rajasthan. Bhakti Sharma holds a Master`s degree from Symbiosis International University in Communications Management.
Career of Bhakti Sharma
Bhakti Sharma started swimming when she was just 2.5 years old. After having participated in many State and District Level competitions, her first open water (Sea) swim was a 16 km swim from Uran port to Gateway of India in 2003. Sharma was 14 years old that time. Bhakti Sharma is the first Asian woman and the youngest in the world to set a record in open swimming in Antarctic waters. Bhakti Sharma swam 1.4 miles (2.3 km) in 41.14 minutes, at a temperature of 1 degree Celsius breaking the record of Lynne Cox (USA) and Lewis Pugh (Great Britain). Bhakti Sharma has swum in all the five oceans of the world, besides swimming across eight other seas and channels she was awarded the Tenzing Norgay National Adventure Award in 2010. Bhakti Sharma is only the third person in the world to have swum across the Arctic Ocean, and recently swam in the Antarctic Ocean to become the youngest to swim in all five oceans, a feat which earned her recognition from Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Achievements of Bhakti Sharma
Her swimming career in just a little over 10 years is commendable and some major milestones include the 2006, while she crossed the English Channel in 13 hours 55 minutes, on 6th July at the age of 16 she again won in a completion from Shakespeare Beach, Dover England to Calais, France, in 2006: Winning the Lake Zurich Swim, on January 10, 2015, Bhakti Sharma became the youngest in the world and first Asian girl to swim in freezing water of Antartica for 2.25 km, beating the record of British open water swimming champion Lewis Pugh and American swimmer Lynne Cox. Sharma swam for 52 minutes, covering 2.25 km distance in the freezing waters of Antarctica Ocean while the temperature was one degree. She performed the record-breaking swim with the sponsorship of Hindustan Zinc Limited.