Bossabean Award

The Bossabean award is given in memory of Gary Neimeyer.

Gary was one of the early leaders of the Waikiki Swim Club. His participation in the Waikiki Roughwater Swim first shows up in the records in 1975 when he was 28 years old, swam the race in 56 minutes 46 seconds, won his age group and was 12th overall, 6 minutes behind the winner.

The next year, 1976, was the same result: 1st in the age group, 17th overall, 53:17 and 7 minutes behind the leader.

In 1977, at 30 years old and the new bottom of the age group, Gary apparently was working too hard on his PHD in Oceanography from UH and his swimming slipped a little. His time was 1:02:18; 7th in the 30 year age group, 26th overall and 11 minutes behind the winner. His wife, Susan, beat him that year.

In September 1978 Gary missed the swim due to work. In December 1978 Gary along with 2 other UH reasearchers(Robert Harvey and Michael Allen) and 7 other people were lost at sea aboard the Holoholo en route from Snug Harbor to Kawaihae on the Big Island.. They left Snug Harbor, bound for Kawaihae to pick up additional researchers and never arrived. Gale force winds and high seas in the Molokai Channel were the most likely explanation of what happened to the Holoholo. They were going to take measurements of the currents and temperatures to determine the feasibility of an Ocean Thermal
Energy Conversion project (OTEC) that is up and running today.

Gary's family donated the Bossabean Cup Perpetual Trophy in his memory. The cup goes to the winner of the age group that Gary would be swimming in
today.