{"id":3092,"date":"2026-06-12T08:07:00","date_gmt":"2026-06-12T08:07:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/clube-swim4fun.pt\/?p=3092"},"modified":"2026-06-11T22:13:41","modified_gmt":"2026-06-11T22:13:41","slug":"a-travessia-que-me-obrigou-a-enfrentar-tudo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/clube-swim4fun.pt\/en\/a-travessia-que-me-obrigou-a-enfrentar-tudo\/","title":{"rendered":"The Crossing That Forced Me to Face Everything"},"content":{"rendered":"
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There was a time when this challenge was, for me, completely unthinkable and impossible. One of those challenges that the mind immediately puts in the drawer of \"this is not for me.\" Over time, it ended up transforming first into a distant dream and, one day, into a very real achievement within me. The last three years were not simple. Between stoppages, health problems, injuries, and phases where I practically didn't train at all, the idea of facing this crossing often seemed more like a psychological burden than a sporting goal. Knowing that I wasn't at my best made mental management as hard as the kilometers inside the water.\n\nThe \"Grande Descida de Castelo de Bode,\" with its 50 km, was not, for me, just a race. It was a true challenge to body and mind. Step by step, the landscapes were simply beautiful, the kind that almost make you want to stop swimming just to appreciate the scenery. The water temperature was a bit cool, but nothing scary \u2013 enough to keep us alert without taking away the pleasure of the crossing.\n\nMy story with swimming also helps explain the weight of this achievement. I started swimming as a federated athlete in 2019 and completed that full season. Then came the pandemic, with a year and half of stoppages and uncertainty. I returned and did another full year, but the following year university took center stage and training fell behind. In 2023 I changed clubs and still trained for a few months, until health problems and other injuries once again messed everything up and dragged on until early 2026. Between ups and downs, when I reached this adventure in Castelo de Bode, I hadn't trained for almost two months, and before that, I was training only when time allowed.\n\nSo I can say with some confidence that sometimes what's most important isn't being at peak form, it's understanding technique, knowing our body, and telling our mind: \"We're going to do this and that's it.\" I accepted going even without being at my best phase because I wanted to prove to myself that I was capable. I didn't focus on others' opinions \u2013 I focused on the desire to try. Life, in the end, was made for that: to try, even when the context isn't perfect.\n\nThere was one race in particular that marked this journey greatly. My family ended up not being able to be present, and due to logistical issues, I did about 7 km without eating anything after the 4.5 km. It was exhausting, physically and emotionally. Still, it was also one of those moments where I realized how far my body \u2013 and my mind \u2013 could go, even with all these \"extras\" pulling me down. The way I dealt with fatigue and the lack of nutrition was purely psychological warfare. The brain rules the body, and in those moments, the struggle is truly internal: one stroke at a time, without thinking too much about what's still left.\n\nOn the eve of the 11 km, the final stage, anxiety hit hard. The classic doubt settled in: \"What if I don't go? What if I'm not prepared? What if I can't handle it?\" Instead of feeding that cycle, I decided to do the opposite: I put in my earphones, chose a song that calmed me, disconnected from the world, and let myself fall asleep. The next day, there I was, at the water's edge, anxious and scared, but ready to dive headfirst into what, until today, has been the greatest achievement of my life as a swimmer.\n\nAnd curiously, today I see that fear is also important: it's what keeps us alert and attentive to everything around us. More than a sequence of kilometers, the Grande Descida de Castelo de Bode was a long conversation between me, my body, my mind, my recent past, and what I still want to be as a swimmer. In the end, the message was clear: even when everything seems to be playing against us, there's always a part of us that's capable of going a little further.\n\nIf there's something this experience taught me is that we shouldn't wait for the perfect time or the perfect year to challenge ourselves. If you can't make it, you couldn't make it \u2013 and that's fine. But at least you tried something many never even dare to attempt. And sometimes, it's precisely there that the true achievement begins.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lu\u00eds Correia<\/strong><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Houve uma altura em que esta prova era, para mim, completamente impens\u00e1vel e imposs\u00edvel. Um daqueles desafios que a cabe\u00e7a arruma logo na gaveta do \u201cisso n\u00e3o \u00e9 para mim\u201d. Com o tempo, acabou por se transformar primeiro num sonho distante e, um dia, numa conquista muito real dentro de mim. Os \u00faltimos tr\u00eas anos … <\/p>\n

Read more “A Travessia que me Obrigou a Enfrentar Tudo”<\/span><\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3093,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[55],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3092","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sem-categoria-en"],"featured_image_src":"https:\/\/clube-swim4fun.pt\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/image-1.png","author_info":{"display_name":"Clube Swim4fun","author_link":"https:\/\/clube-swim4fun.pt\/en\/author\/geralclube-swim4fun-pt\/"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/clube-swim4fun.pt\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3092","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/clube-swim4fun.pt\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/clube-swim4fun.pt\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clube-swim4fun.pt\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clube-swim4fun.pt\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3092"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/clube-swim4fun.pt\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3092\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3094,"href":"https:\/\/clube-swim4fun.pt\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3092\/revisions\/3094"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clube-swim4fun.pt\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3093"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/clube-swim4fun.pt\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3092"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clube-swim4fun.pt\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3092"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clube-swim4fun.pt\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3092"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}