Welcome Team Member Tate Matthews

Name: Tate Matthews

Age: 52

City: Mililani, HI

Swimming background: Schofield Sharks, age group and high school in Fairfax, VA

Rough water experience: Escape from Alcatraz, ’04, ’07, San Diego Sharkfest, ’10, plenty kine days at Makapuu, Sandy’s, Pyramid Rock

Goal for this race: Captain of Brooks’ support team

Favorite sport: Reciting nonsensical lyrics from “They Might Be Giants” albums

Favorite sports team: Dallas Cowboys

Favorite shark species: Tiger (those stripes are so slimming!)

Body part that hurts the most after working out: I pay people to work out for me

Welcome Team Member Ted Barnett

Name: Ted Barnett

Age: 46

Job: Semi-retired airline pilot, kite surfer, guitarist in Zeppelin band

Passion: Doing math homework with my kids. OK, red wine and NFL, actually

Swimming background: None, except of Sharkfest 2007 (still recovering from that)

Goal for this race: To not be rescued by kayaker and to honor Skylar

Current gripes: NBA season may not happen, and financial stocks

Welcome to Team Members Jim Bahrenburg and Galen Weiss

Name: Jim Bahrenburg

Age: 46

City: Long Beach, CA

Swimming background: Nothing formal (which explains why I am officially the slowest Matthews/Bahrenburg sibling on record)

Rough water experience: Enjoy doing the Alcatraz swim once a year since 2003 (thank you, Maggie, for the motivation)

Goal for this race: Finish safely with the entire RFTS team and achieve our team goals

Favorite sport: Anything my boys will play

Favorite sports team: UCLA Bruins, Bruins, Bruins!

Favorite shark species: Angel Shark

Favorite superhero: I’m going with Aquaman for swimming inspiration and his nifty ability to communicate with sea creatures

Name: Galen Weiss (no photo available)

Age: 46

City: Cambellsville, Kentucky

Swimming background: Had fun in the pool playing Marco Polo as a child

Rough water experience: Did some tubing in the Ohio River

Goal for this race: Finish the swim in time for the meal

Favorite sport: Squash, golf, eating

Favorite sports team: None that I don’t like

Favorite shark species: Hammerhead

Favorite superhero: Superman

Welcome to Team Member John Townsley

Name: John “Hambone” Townsley

Age: 47

City: Dallas, TX

Swimming background: I never had an appreciation for swimming/beach until I moved to 400 miles from the closest beach. I took up “competitive” swimming at age 34 to stay in shape for surfing, et al.

Rough water experience: Waikiki Roughwater Swim, Alcatraz Tri, and many other triathlons

Goal for this race: I HOPE TO NOT FINISH LAST

Favorite sports: Surfing (all forms), swimming, running, triathlons, Formula 1 racing

Favorite sports team: Tampa Bay Buccaneers, LA Lakers, Oregon St., anyone playing Notre Dame

Favorite shark species: Great Whites

Favorite superhero: The irascible Bugs Bunny