First time swimmers around the island, Joey Pedraza and Taylor Sheppard didn’t wait long to make their mark on Saturday’s FKCC Swim Around Key West. Pedraza finished the race first overall in a blazing time of four hours, six minutes and fifty seconds. Meanwhile, Sheppard wasn’t too far behind coming in just past the five hour mark: five hours, twelve minutes and seventeen seconds.

Pedraza described the experience as “unique” and realized he had a good chance to win when he set his pace early on, despite getting lost in the middle of it all.
“I got lost at one point. It was my first time swimming around the island,” said Pedraza, who is originally from Cuba, “When we got to White Street Pier, I knew I was in the lead. I wasn’t really trying to be in the lead, but I just held my pace from the beginning and just picked it up from there.” Pedraza led for the majority of the race, entering the Cow Key Channel well in front of the pack. “We planned around the tides. It was what I expected,” said Pedraza, who had only heard about the race four weeks ago, “It was pretty tough out there. It’s certainly a unique experience.”

Unlike Pedraza, Taylor Sheppard said she had “no idea” she was in the lead amongst the solo female swimmers. Taylor, who’s originally from the Hawaiian island of Maui, said she finished better than she expected. “During miles three through nine I was just cruising,” said Sheppard, who’s currently a graduate student at the University of Virginia, “The tides were great. It was pretty tough coming around the other side here, it was so shallow, I felt like I didn’t have much clearance under me.” And she didn’t. As she swam in the 11th mile of the 12.5 mile race, Sheppard snagged the reef and suffered a small cut on her foot. “I was at the boat at number 11 and I stopped for water and when I kicked off, my foot hit the reef.” said Taylor, “That was a bummer, but it was okay, I was pretty happy with my time, it was faster than I expected.” Taylor thought the race was “awesome” and described it as being “well-organized”.

“The monofin swimmer was close to me, too,” said Sheppard, “That was interesting. I am impressed that he did that. I would never think to do that. Yeah, he crushed it too.”

The monofin swimmer that she was describing was Luke Knight, who became the first person to swim around Key West using the single dolphin-like fin. Knight finished close to the time Sheppard did, completing the swim in 5 hours, five minutes and fifteen seconds. After the swim, Knight said it was “definitely everything” he expected.