A mother-of-two from Five Oak Green has unwittingly set a new world record while swimming the English Channel for charity.

Jackie Cobell, 56, entered the record books after her marathon 28-hour, 44-minute swim last weekend was confirmed as the slowest ever.

The Five Oak Green Road resident broke the previous longest time of 26 hours, 50 minutes, set in 1923, after being dragged onto a zigzag course by strong tides.

Speaking to the Courier two days later, an exhausted Mrs Cobell said: "I didn't know I had been in the sea that long, because you can't take a watch or see where you have been or where you are going.

"I was seeing certain landmarks and thinking, 'Oh, I'll be coming in here,' but the tide just took me parallel to the beaches and kept sweeping me away. I was using all my energy up and my arms weren't stronger than the tide."

Husband David estimated his wife ended up swimming an incredible 65 miles – 44 more than the channel's 21-mile width – before reaching land just north of Calais on Sunday morning.

It was five years ago, when foster carer Mrs Cobell weighed 20 stone and suffered from high blood pressure, that she began training for the swim in a bid to improve her health and raise money for Huntington's Disease, a hereditary disorder of the central nervous system which affects some of her family members.

Gastric band surgery and training swims in the channel and Lake Windermere helped her lose eight stone for last week's crossing, although the hours of practice caused shoulder problems which required two operations.

"My arm packed up again about halfway through and it was difficult to keep lifting it up," she said. "But my trainer Tanya just said, 'Oh nonsense,' and gave me some paracetamol.

"She says I'm like one of those clockwork frogs you wind up, because I keep going and going."

The pain was all worth it when Mrs Cobell was greeted with a surprise champagne reception on the French coast and realised how much money she had raised.

Mrs Cobell said: "I never thought about giving up. I thought, 'I am going to do this for myself, my friends, my family and for the charity.'"

She added: "I suppose I am proud of my determination and of staying in the water all those hours, but I don't know if being the slowest is anything to be proud of."

To add to Jackie's sponsorship total, visit www.justgiving.com/jackiecobell