Marthe Robert
Robert was born in 1888 as the daughter of a swimming teacher at Lake Neuchâtel. She started with swimming when she was five years old. She was training with her father and her older sister Cécile Robert in Lake Neuchâtel. All year long, even in the winter. She started with training with a 100 metre at full speed. In 1904 she crosses the lake during a race, a distance of 7.6 kilometres, in 3 hours and 40 minutes. The next year she crosse the lake together with her sister in 2 hours and 50 minutes. In this race she was faster than painter Philipp Ritter. Behind her 15 men gave up.