Prisha Tapre, age 16, from Watford, Hertfordshire, swam the 35km stretch of water between England and France in under 12 hours in early September, making her the youngest swimmer to do so this year, raising nearly £5000 for charity in the process!
Prisha started swimming competitively from an early age, with no hint of what was to come, until seeing the opportunity for collecting medals at regional level, Watford Swimming Club took on open water coach Jeremy Irvine. Under his guidance, and with COVID-19 keeping her away from indoor pools, Prisha began dipping her toes in Denham Lake and Waterski Club, before travelling to open water events across the UK. Within a year, she had taken the plunge and signed to do the Channel swim solo.
In an interview with Prisha, she said ‘the training involved lots of increasingly long open-water swims, ranging from relays with fellow competitive swimmers to the six-hour qualifier at Dover’, designed to replicate the conditions of the big day. Under the rules of the Channel Swimming Association, Prisha could wear nothing more than a swimsuit, hat and goggles, swim in water under 16 degrees celsius and receive food and fluid via a feeding stick - no mean feat! She pushed her endurance to the limit in her final long-distance event before the Channel in a two-way Ullswater swim - an arduous thirty-two kilometres.
Juggling training alongside revision for her upcoming GCSEs meant that the endeavour was not without its challenges, but Prisha explained, ‘It was really therapeutic and it was calming. There’s never much time or many places where you can just chill. At home, I can hear my phone, there are distractions around me… you’re never just by yourself, never in a room with your thoughts. If something was on my mind, and I’d been avoiding it, [training for this event] forced me to think about it. During my GCSE’s it was my safe space’.
Close to Prisha’s heart and very much on her mind, providing motivation during the long hours of training, was her fundraising for Akshaya Patra, a charity raising awareness and providing solutions to food poverty in the UK and India. Given that she has family in both countries and is aware of the need for the charity’s support at home and abroad, Prisha was keen to complete the swim successfully – if not for herself, then for all of the money that would be raised as a result.
With competitive and open water swimming having few role models from minority ethnic communities, Prisha wants to prove to young people, girls especially, that they are able to achieve great things and break through stereotypes. Completing the solo Channel swim was a dream come true for Prisha and she hopes her achievement will show others how far a strong mindset and perseverance can take them; that you are never too young to dream big.
