Swimming, Paralympic champion Simone Barlaam swims among sharks

Simone Barlaam won another challenge: swim among white sharks. The Paralympic champion from Milan (one gold, two silver and one bronze in swimming in Tokyo) has made his “childhood dream” come true. “I’ve always admired their duality: agile and graceful but at the same time powerful and decisive in the water”, says Simone in the video YouTube from his hotel in Port Lincoln, South Australia.

It all started from a chat with George Scala, a swimming photographer, who introduced him to the Rodney Fox Expedition, an Australian agency for underwater excursions to admire the great marine predators live. “Fox was a diver and fishing champion who survived the attack of a white shark. He decided to bring people back to the oceans to make it clear that we are invading the territory”, continues Simone, in Australia for the competitions and ready to ‘occasion. He left by boat from Port Lincoln, in the first leg of the journey he admired the wallabees, “very tender cousins ​​of kangaroos”, he did snorkelling with the sea lions: “I was amazed, they looked like our domestic dogs! They followed us, they played with pirouettes. Incredible with how few movements they manage to advance so much in the water, it’s professional bias…”. The day before the actual meeting, the companions told many curiosities about sharks (“They have blue eyes, not black”), also talking about the atrocities suffered by man (“they cut off their fins and the sharks drown , cannot filter the air in the gills”). Then, finally, Simone was able to dive (protected by the cage) with the feared marine predators. “At the beginning there was only blue, and not seeing the shark was almost scarier than seeing it – remembers Simone – Then this creature appears, and my mouth is open. We saw three male sharks, I was thrilled”. Yes, because the spectacle of three “so big but so graceful” creatures doesn’t happen every day. “And that’s where you realize that sharks aren’t just teeth and a jaw.”