Ooh la la! 70-year-old becomes the oldest person to swim the Channel (in a mere 17 hours and 51 minutes)

By Richard Hartley-parkinson
Updated: 05:37 EST, 1 September 2011

View
comments

A retired breast cancer surgeon has become the oldest person to swim the English Channel – aged 70 years and four months.

Roger Allsopp set off from Shakespeare Beach in Dover, Kent, at 8am on Tuesday and swam for 17 hours and 51 minutes to arrive at Cap Gris-Nez in France and claim the title.

Previous record-holder George Brunstad, the uncle of Hollywood star Matt Damon, was 70 years and four days old when he completed the feat in 2004.

Grandfather Roger Allsopp, 70 years and four months, became the oldest person to swim the Channel

Mr Allsopp looks across the English Channel before he sets off on his 21 nautical mile swim

Mr Allsopp set off at 8am and swam the 21 nautical miles for 17 hours and 51 minutes until he got to the French coast.

He said: 'I do feel an immense sense of achievement and relief that I have been successful.

'This has been an incredible personal challenge for me and my focus has always been to help raise money for Hope for Guernsey and Wessex Medical Research, a cause that I am extremely passionate about.

The retired breast cancer surgeon said he felt relief and a sense of achievement after completing the swim

'Coupled with the fact that a man of my 'grand' age can achieve such a physical and mental challenge proves that you can live younger if you keep active in mind and body.'

His effort was recognised by the Guinness World Records and adjudicator Anna Orford said: ''To swim the English Channel is a great challenge and to do it at the mature age of 70 years is astounding.

'We are very pleased to congratulate Roger on this achievement and in doing so setting a new Guinness World Record.'

Mr Allsopp decided to take on the challenge after seeing an inscription at a pub in Dover that marked Mr Brunstad's cross-Channel achievement.

His attempt came 136 years after British merchant navy captain Matthew Webb became the first person to swim the Channel, doing the breaststroke from Dover to Cap Gris Nez in 21 hours, 45 minutes.

Mr Allsopp has been raising money to fund world-class medical equipment to help advance cancer research at the University of Southampton.

He added: 'I've never been one to sit on my laurels. Retirement has been wonderful but I know how important it is to keep active in mind and body to live a healthy retirement and so I set myself physical challenges to ensure that I keep as fit and healthy as I can.

'This record-breaking swim will hopefully raise a large proportion of the £750,000 that is needed to fund cancer research. The great thing about this money is that it will all go direct to purchasing this technology.'

The waters looked cold as Mr Allsopp set of from Shakespeare Beach at 8am on Tuesday

The money would pay for new equipment to analyse the blood of cancer patients and non-cancer patients to develop a test that would give a pre-warning of cancer.

He has received a personal pledge of £250,000 from Derek Coates, the chairman of nutritional and well-being supplement company Healthspan.

Grandfather-of-three Mr Allsopp has a record of physical challenges having run the London Marathon aged 60 and completed his first Channel swim at the age of 65 in 2006, at the time becoming the oldest Briton to do so.