Mission Baltic: Starting signal for Maciek Rutkowski's Baltic Sea crossing

Thursday is the day that Maciek Rutkowski and his many helpers have been working towards for a very long time: He starts at 7:00 a.m. in Sandhamn, Sweden, and then wants to surf more than 200 kilometres across the Baltic Sea to Poland - that's the plan. The waiting time has been running since 9 September, and tomorrow the wind and weather should be right for the mission. The aim is to set a new record of under seven hours and raise money for a good cause. Maciek Rutkowski recently told us all about his project in an interview:

• From Sweden to Poland: Mission Baltic Sea crossing - three questions for Maciek Rutkowski

The "Mission: Baltic" will be broadcast via livestream. The escort boats and Maciek himself are equipped with smartphones and cameras for this purpose, and there will also be live data and even original sound from Maciek himself. "Galaxy smartphones equipped with state-of-the-art cameras will be attached directly to the equipment, while the entire route will be broadcast live on his YouTube channel. Galaxy smartwatches will record parameters such as distance, speed, heart rate, calories burned and time remaining to the finish line in real time. In this way, the extreme effort will be translated into numbers!", the organisers announced.

After many appearances on Polish TV in which Maciek talked about his mission, the 2022 foil world champion and his team are already on their way to Sweden. It will be the toughest and most dangerous race he has ever done, said Rutkowski in the run-up. "Surfing more than 200 kilometres on one course will be a big challenge, but the organisational, logistical and media challenges are probably even bigger!" At the finish line, the Polish "surf capital" of Wladislawowo, a big welcome party awaits Meciek and his team.

You can watch the livestream here on surf-Magazin.de from tomorrow morning!