Daisy Ridley's 'Young Woman and the Sea' to Stream on Disney+ This July
With the Paris Games fast approaching everyone's catching a little bit of Olympic fever, even Disney+. The streamer is getting in the inspirational spirit by dropping its sports drama Young Woman and the Sea mid-month, just before the kick-off of the 33rd Olympiad. The film tells the story of one of the most impressive female athletes in history and a remarkable achievement that too few likely know about.
Gertrude "Trudy" Ederle was the first woman to swim across the English Channel in 1926. The daughter of German immigrants, she was a member of the U.S. team that won gold at the 1924 Olympics --- which also happened to take place in Paris --in the 4x100 relay. (And took home a pair of bronze medals in individual events herself.) She turned professional in 1925, before deciding the following year to set herself a new challenge: to swim the Channel, a feat that had never even been attempted by a woman.
Though Ederle's first attempt failed, her second, in which she was coached by Bill Burgess, a swimmer who had himself successfully crossed in 1911, saw her traverse the Channel's 21 miles in fourteen and half hours, beating the fastest man’s record by a hundred and twenty minutes. It was the first time in sporting history that a woman had completed an event in a faster time than a man. How's that for girl power?
