'Told I'd never walk again after deadly crash, now I've broken world record'

He was told he would never walk again after a horrific coach smash left him paralysed. But 36-year-old Paralympian Zach Washington-Young has become the first ever person with a spinal cord injury to swim the Strait of Gibraltar - the gruelling 15-mile stretch from Europe to Africa, across one of the world's busiest shipping lanes. And as he celebrated with a kiss from girlfriend, Juls Tobon, who was in the accompanying boat, the physical pain and deep torment of the last 14 years finally washed away. Zach said: "The elation as I drew close to the finish after four hours in the water to reach Africa was immense. "I’ve always wanted to combine my physical recovery with my passion for being alive and turn the whole process into adventures, this was one of those moments." Just a few weeks earlier, Zach suffered hypothermia after a practice swim in the Strait, which almost dashed his hopes of attempting the challenge. The swim, completed last month, (Sept) showed Zach how far he had come since severing his spinal cord in a crash which claimed the lives of two of his friends and left him paralysed from the waist down. He said: “Knowing that after everything I’d been through I was somehow able to swim between two continents made it really special. I reflected on the life I have now with Juls and my son, it made me really emotional.” Zach was travelling home to Liverpool from Bestival music festival on the Isle of Wight in September 2012, when a tyre on the coach he was in exploded causing it to career off the road and crash into a tree. Then 22, Zach was thrown through the windscreen. His two friends, Michael Molloy, 18, and Kerry Ogden, 23, died instantly, along with the driver. Doctors were amazed that Zach survived the crash in Hindhead, Surrey, but repeatedly told him he would never walk again. He recalled: “The doctor said my injuries were so severe that if I walked again he would eat his tie, that stuck with me.” Always a keen sportsman, making into Everton Football team as a young man and before the crash becoming an emerging talent in Mixed Martial Arts, Zach suddenly felt as if his whole world had collapsed. He said: “I was so grateful to be alive but the news that I would spend the rest of my life in a wheelchair was devastating. I had been studying Law at Liverpool John Moores University. In an instant everything was taken away.” Zach’s mum, Emma, searched for a facility where her son could be helped towards his dream of walking again. And he spoke to Claire Lomas MBE, who had been paralysed after a fall at the Osberton Horse Trials. Told she’d never walk again, she defied the odds, and pointed him towards PrimePhysio - a revolutionary rehab clinic near Cambridge where, in December 2014, he took his first steps. Sadly, Claire, who also completed the London Marathon, died from injuries sustained in a microlight crash in August 2024, while filming for an Apple commissioned series in Jordan. Meanwhile, Zach used equipment including an exoskeleton suit and a DEN2X stimulation machine, which made his paralysed muscles contract, creating healthier muscle tissue. In November 2015, he did a one mile walk around a lake with a Zimmer frame. Then he completed the Liverpool Half Marathon in 2017 on crutches. And, in 2018, ran the London Marathon on crutches - then summiting Mount Snowden in 2020. Then he asked Paralympian royalty Ellie Simmonds’ coach, Billy Pye MBE, to train him. He said: “I’d always loved swimming and I approached Billy Pye at an event and asked him to train me. It was an amazing experience training with Ellie and Billy at 5:30am, I couldn’t believe that I was training with the best of the best. “In the water I felt free and in 2021 I went for a trial and was offered a place with Team GB. After everything that had happened, I finally felt as if things were going my way. I swam freestyle and was 12th in the world in the 400m freestyle.” During this time, Zach had a chance meeting with Juls, as he checked in at the airport in Tenerife. He said: “I saw this beautiful woman behind me and I kept seeing her in the airport. As fate would have it, we were seated next to each other on the flight to Barcelona, but I was shy and didn’t speak to her, even though I really wanted to. "As we made our way through the airport, we ended up in a lift together and began chatting. We shared a taxi into the city and I asked her out on a date the next night. We hit it off and have been inseparable ever since. “When I found out Juls was pregnant, it was a big shock as I was training hard for GB and knew I’d have another job on my hands then. I had always been told that it would be impossible to have a child naturally, but I could try IVF. Once it sunk in that she had conceived naturally, I realised how amazing it really was. “We named our son Chance, as that is our story. He is a miracle and the chances of him existing were so small, almost impossible odds. To have gone from that place of no hope back in the dark days after the accident, to walking the London Marathon, swimming for Team GB, meeting Juls and having a son, was just unbelievable.” His son, Chance, waved him off from the beach at Tarifa for his latest challenge and his actor dad, Peter Washington, was also in the boat accompanying him. Zach said: “The swim from Europe to Africa was my latest endeavour. After the hypothermia, I did feel as if I may not be able to do it and I even went in the boat on another swim someone else was doing, so I could feel the water, as I was told the first 45 minutes is the coldest and then it warms up. “I wanted to know what I was letting myself in for after the shock of hypothermia. I kept my energy up by eating mashed sweet potato with pear every hour, dates, coconut water, and warm tea with honey. It’s important to keep the blood sugar levels up when you’re dealing with cold temperatures.” Zach has also sold the rights to his life story to a production company, with a film now in development to tell his inspirational story. He is now planning on setting up the ZWY Spinal Foundation to help others in a similar position. He said: “I found it so hard to get the help I needed, so I want to help others achieve what I have.” Zach said his next goal is to be able to walk unaided without any crutches and says he is willing to go to America to try stem cell therapy to achieve that. “I want to be able to do things with my son without limits,” he explained. I’d also love to do a cycle challenge and go from Lands End to John O’Groats, I’d need to adapt a bike with stabilisers and then who knows, I believe anything is possible if you really apply yourself. I’m always challenging myself, I love to do things with a sense of adventure and the feeling of being truly alive. “Everyday when I wake up I take a few minutes in gratitude to appreciate that I’m still here, I have a scar on my right hand side, which is the side Michael, Kerry and the driver Colin were on, every time I look at it, it reminds me how close I came to not making it. “Surviving gave me another shot at life and I’m determined to make the most of it and not waste a second.”