A Boy in the Water by Tom Gregory

In 1988, aged just 11 years and 330 days, Tom Gregory set off from the French coast in a bid to become the youngest person to ever swim the English Channel. Almost 12 hours later he arrived in Dover, cold and exhausted, but pushed on by his brilliant coach John Bullet. In episode 9 of Sportspages, Gregory recalls the remarkable story of how he went from not being able to swim a width without touching the bottom, to navigating the world's busiest shipping lane, and why he waited 25 years to put pen to paper. His memoir, A Boy in the Water was a dual winner of the 2018 William Hill Sports Book of the Year.