Girl, 16, becomes one of youngest to swim Channel

A 16-year-old girl who has become one of the youngest people to swim the English Channel said “this is just the start” of her swimming journey.

Prisha Tapre from Watford in Hertfordshire swam around 21 miles (34 kilometres) from Dover to Cap Gris Nez with a time of 11 hours and 48 minutes on September 4 while raising money for charity.

Prisha, who swims with Watford Swimming Club, told the PA news agency: “It just feels unreal. I still haven’t got my head around the fact I’ve swam the English Channel but I feel really good.”

Prisha said she had been training for the day for a quarter of her life as she took up swimming aged 12.

She has gone on to participate in numerous competitions before successfully taking on parts of the Channel as part of a relay team last year.

The teenager said one of her main concerns with the swim was setting off in the dark, as she does not have much experience swimming in darkness.

“Over the first two hours, it was choppy and it was dark, but I got over it, that was probably the worst part of my swim,” she said.

“After that, it all settled down and it was perfect, I could not ask for anything better. And it was warm. It was 19 degrees, but it was really still.”

The teenage swimmer has been balancing studying for her GCSEs with extensive training for the swim, going on six-hour swims each weekend as well as one 10 hour swim.

Prisha wanted to take on an ambitious challenge as well as encourage young girls from ethnic minorities to take on sports like swimming.

She said: “I think I wanted to prove to myself that I could do something big. I wanted to do something different, and I just wanted to challenge myself.

“I’ve noticed that there aren’t a lot of ethnic minorities, like Asian girls, in competitive sports like swimming, and I just really wanted to influence other younger girls to go against the stereotypes.

“I feel like by doing this and by letting people know what I’m doing, it could hopefully let other girls also try to take on things like this.”

Swimming has been positive for her mental health as she has learned to quieten her mind, she said.

Prisha explained: “I trained my mind to think about nothing. It’s almost as if I’m meditating in the water, so I used to go into a trance and just think about nothing, and that’s what I like.

“It’s like the only place you could be calm and even during my GCSE exams, I used to go down to the lake, not for training, but just as like a little calm place where I don’t have to worry about friends, schools, exams, revision.

“It was just a place for me to de-stress and I feel like everyone should have that one place where they go to because without it you just have no peace.”

The teenager said she was “really happy” to have raised over £3,700 for Akshaya Patra UK, a charity with a mission to end hunger and food poverty among children in India and the UK.

Prisha said she has “no idea” what will come next but added: “I just know that I want to keep going. This is just the start.”

Open water coach at Watford Swimming Club Jeremy Irvine said: “Prisha showed just what can be accomplished by perseverance and training.

“It’s been an honour and privilege to be part of this amazing team who have helped Prisha’s dream become a reality.”