A man has pulled off a Channel crossing on a wing foil, gliding from Plymouth to France in less than seven hours.
Martin Gavériaux, 41, from Larmor-Plage in Brittany, covered about 120 miles (196km) to reach Roscoff in six hours, 56 minutes in what is thought to be the first crossing between the two points of its kind.
“I love doing long distance,” said marine engineer Gavériaux, who completed the same crossing on a windsurfer in 2014.
In wing foiling, a rider stands on a board and uses the wind’s power via a handheld, inflatable wing to glide across the water on an underwater hydrofoil.
At one point, near the French coast, the wind nearly vanished, said Gavériaux, who was born in Yeovil, Somerset. “I had, I would say, five knots wind speed, maybe less, so I was completely stopped,” he said.
The conditions mostly held on the day of the challenge, 9 May, and there were moments of magic too, including close encounters with dolphins.
“I passed very, very close from two of them,” he said.
Gavériaux said he had completed several other long-distance journeys around the north western coast of France, prior to the latest challenge.
“I am in the water most days,” he said. “I like long distance sailing, to go from one place to another one.”
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