The 28-year-old this February, after starting at Kinloch, pulled ashore in Queenstown Bay after six hours of strong headwinds below Cecil Peak sapped her strength.
She still became the first person, without a wetsuit, to cover that 46km, taking 16 hours 50 minutes.
Smith’s support team was headed up her coach, Kiwi long distance swimming legend Philip Rush.
She says he said, "realistically, if you kept going there’s a chance you’d be yanked out somewhere, and that’s not really going to be much of a finish, or you could just get to Queenstown".
After completing 47km, she’d not felt destroyed by the swim, giving her confidence she can make the full 82km at her next attempt.
"You know, there’s a reason why no one’s done it successfully in togs before."
A Wellingtonian, Ben Campbell-McDonald, did attempt the feat in togs in 2009, but when he failed went back and completed the distance in a wetsuit three years later.
Smith’s currently averaging 45 to 50km a week in pool training which she’ll up to 60km next month, then she’ll also do one long open water swim as final preparation in January.
For this next attempt she’ll try early rather than late February — "hopefully we’ll have slightly better winds".
Smith — who in 2022 swam Foveaux Strait in a world-record 6hr 19min 45sec — says if she completes her swim this time, in a predicted 28 to 32 hours, "it’ll be a lot of sitting down and sleeping, and then a lot of beers, I think".
Meanwhile, she’s grateful to NZONE Skydive, Active Adventures and other local businesses for helping her meet the cost of her first swim — she also managed to raise $6480 for youth mental health charity, I Am Hope.
