Courtney Moates Paulk doesn't just swim with sharks in the courtroom—she's in the water with them, too. An open-water marathon swimmer, Paulk earned the sport's Triple Crown in 2013 by traversing the English Channel, the Catalina Channel and the perimeter of Manhattan Island. Last year, she became one of only seven people in the world to have crossed the shark-infested waters of Cape Cod Bay, completing the swim in a record-setting 9 hours and 43 minutes. And she does it all alone, assisted only by a small crew following her in a boat to monitor her progress and toss food down to her. No wetsuit, no breaks and no respite from the busy construction law practice she maintains as chair of the litigation section of Hirschler Fleischer in Richmond, Virginia.But Paulk's accomplishments are more than personal victories. Every swim she's undertaken since 2010 has been for charity, and she's raised more than $50,000 for a variety of organizations, including local nonprofits that give swimming lessons to low-income kids and major research foundations such as the American Heart Association.
Jun 1, 2015 6:30 AM CDT
