How to Write Like an Athlete on Fire! Grit, Grace, and Achievement!

Monika Mittaz free swimming Lake Lugano in June 2026

Student Athletes are strong in the classroom and in the sports arena, but they do not always write with panache. They want to combine the rigors of study with the zeal of dreams and challenges real and imagined. Get rewarded with scholarships, praise, and early offers by adding strong, meaningful essays to your film. Smart athletes use their talents to get themselves into highly competitive universities better than those they could reach purely via academics. More often than not however, their initial writing is flat, because they forget to share with the reader the exhilaration of the experience.

So approach it powerfully from the onset- start from how you felt in the moment that the challenge was before you. And then spread out from there. Take a note from women and men in the throes of international athletic careers. People who wake up and say, in a few months I’m going to swim the English Channel! And then they actually do it. Monika Mittaz is one such athlete extraordinaire. Born American, now Swiss, setting unbelievably huge open water swimming challenges for herself over the age of 40. These are herculean marathons that she calls just “Big Swims”. She swam the English Channel in 13 hours and 38 minutes- passing through some of the busiest shipping lanes in Europe. She swam through a patch of jellyfish and the last two hours in pitch darkness. It was one of the most exhilarating sporting events I have ever tracked end to end.

Slathered in Lanolin to avoid chaffing she swam those 21 miles (33 kilometers) in rough water that is often very cold and not very clean wearing only a bathing suit, a hair cap and goggles. She never stopped moving - she tread water while eating micro portions of food slung out on a rope from her relief boat team. Not allowed to touch the relief boat or allow anyone’s hands to touch her without forfeiting. She was well tempered and appreciative for the experience. It was a wonder to watch. She was as alone as any of us will ever be and one of only six Swiss women or men to ever do it. 

Then two weeks ago she swam the glacial Lake Lugano, a 19 mile (30 kilometer) lake bordering Switzerland and Italy in a blitzing 9 hours and 9 minutes, becoming the first woman to ever do it. “I really pushed hard on this swim and wanted to swim without fear: fear of my body giving out on me, fear of not using my full potential, fear of disappointment.“ Now let those words wash over you and you start to see what an athlete’s perspective can bring to the written word. Talking about grit and grace on another occasion she wrote tellingly: “There's a lot of positive self-talk and affirmations that go into the training, but also during the challenge itself. It's like you have to be your own hype-man and there is a lot of philosophy and present-moment work.”

Next up she will be swimming Loch Awe in the Scottish Highlands - to see how cold is too cold and how far is too far for a marathon swim at 25 miles (41 kilometers)! Every time she swims with courage and a charitable heart - raising money in these last swims for Leman Hope - a worthy organization that takes children in remission out on sailing adventures. Imagine that an athlete of the open air gifts children who have stared down cancer the chance to feel the sun, and the wind, and create memories of wonder on water. Take a page from her life and start writing a story that is singularly yours. I promise you, we all want to read it!