Father and son set record after crossing Channel on electric surfboards

• Video report by ITV News Meridian's Tony Green

A father and son have tried a very different method of getting from coast to coast.Rob Wylie and his son Morgan took less than two hours to cross the English Channel on August 12 on their electric powered boards.

It is a new way to cross the Channel and with it has come a new record.

Rob, from Sandbanks, has been surfing all his life but two years ago he saw an electric powered 'Fliteboard'.

• Rob Wylie

Rob says: "I didn't even know what it was but as soon as I saw it I thought I have to get one of those I have to have a go on one of those".

"It has a battery inside it and that takes the power down a mast into a motor and a prop and that's what drives you through the water. Then the wings that come out underneath the water, that's what lifts the board and the rider".

Riding with his son Morgan they soon realised that crossing the Channel might be possible. 

Rob says: "When we first started riding to find out how much life we could get out of the battery. At first it was like an hour and then an hour and fifteen and then an hour and twenty".

Now they have become the only, and with it the fastest, people to cross by eFoil board,  negotiating ships, seaweed finally arriving in Folkestone in 1 hour and 44 minutes.

With less than 5% battery power remaining.

• Morgan Wylie

Rob's son, Morgan, says: "It was a lot harder than we thought it was going to be so it was a big test for both of us".

"We did probably did the longest we could do on one battery on this journey, but if we had more batteries we could go even further in the future".

That future doubtlessly involves more challenges just over the horizon.