Sporting an “I love Malta t-shirt”, Maltese record breaking rower Thomas Cremona landed at Malta International Airport this afternoon, where he was greeted by family, friends and Sports Parliamentary Secretary Clyde Puli.

Together with his five crew members on the 11-metre Sara G, Thomas spent a gruelling 34 days at sea, smashing the mid-Atlantic world record by 10 hours. The rowers made it into the record books by rowing from Tarfaya, Morocco to Port St Charles, Barbados in 33 days, 21 hours and 46 minutes. They covered 5,098 kilometres at an average speed of 6.3 kilometres per hour.

He said yesterday that he had to continue rowing despite being seasick for most of the trip and there were several instances where he felt he would give up.

Thomas will now be spending some quality time with relaxing family and friends.

This is the third world record the 22-year-old has set in less than three months. He managed the Concept 2 Longest Continual Row on a rowing machine in December and, on January 18, the crew covered a distance of 160 kilometres daily for 10 consecutive days. He is also the first Maltese person to row across the Atlantic.

An accountant by profession, Mr Cremona survived Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia when only four years old. His Row4Cancer campaign is not only about breaking records but aims to reach out and prove there is life after cancer, besides raising funds for Puttinu Cares, the children’s cancer charity.