DARING grandad Roger Allsopp has succeeded in his bid to become the oldest person ever to swim the English Channel.

Just after 2.15am the retired breast cancer surgeon, who worked in Southampton, reached Cap Gris, in France, after a 18-hour swim that started in Dover at 8am yesterday morning.

At 70 years and four months old, the unstoppable granddad-of-three has beaten the current Guinness World Record held by George Brunstad, who was 70 years and four days old.

It comes exactly five years after he became the oldest Briton to swim the Channel, which although is around 23 miles, due to tides, Roger was forced to swim almost double that.

His inspiration this time to plunge into the icy water is to fund pioneering research at the University of Southampton that could lead to the development of a blood test to detect cancer at the earliest possible stage.

Roger, who worked at the Royal South Hants Hospital, hopes to raise £100,000 towards a new £750,000 spectrometer to help further cancer research at the university.