About Me

I spent very little of my childhood indoors and can’t remember a time when I’ve not been active in a sport of some description. The first time I started taking sport seriously though was when I lived in France. I was seven, I would sit at the end of our garden, which backed onto a stretch of river and watch the local canoeing club training. Soon I was getting a pretty good idea of what it took to paddle well. Eventually I announced to my parents that I ‘would be quite good at that’ to which I was told to go and tell them at the club. I did. Within a few months I was winning my first competitions against competitors several years my elder (I was too young to fit into an age category of my own). I continued to collect titles including several regional wins by the time I moved back to the UK. Although I was only eleven I was completely hooked on sport, and more importantly being good at it! I loved the whole process; the racing and the every increasing training load. I was obsessed with getting better!

Unfortunately I was unable to continue my kayaking career in the UK; I no longer lived in the ideal training environment that I had done in France and the English clubs that I eventually joined were reluctant to give me the support I had had previously, despite my successes in Europe. To fill the gap that kayaking had once held I started cross-country running, which led to fell running. Unfortunately I was too young to compete at a level in this sport that was comparable to my achievements in canoeing which disheartened me slightly. My love for the outdoors turned my focus to mountaineering and related endurance events. Over the next few years I kept running for fun and fitness and embarked on a series of expeditions across the UK and Europe including, when I was 17, a month on the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard.

Whilst on a ‘gap year’ in New Zealand, I took part in several adventure races which were perfectly suited to my back-ground. I also started swimming with a local triathlon club; this was my first introduction to the sport. I loved it and it was ideal training for my then goal of joining the Royal Marines as an Officer on my return to the UK. Having passed the gruelling Officer selection I headed to Loughborough University where I joined the triathlon club hoping to maintain my fitness in preparation for my RM officer training after graduating (I have since earned a first class honours degree in Aeronautical engineering and a masters degree in Sport Biomechanics). Loughborough is the home of British Triathlon and many of the UK’s elite athletes (not just tri-athletes). This environment was an amazing one to be in and it re-kindled the feelings I’d first had kayaking as a young boy. I’m hooked, again! I’ve been training hard since 2007 and have learned a fair few hard lessons already through injury.  I often kick myself for it but I’m not interested in doing something because it’s easy. I’m a firm believer that doing something ‘because you can’ is a more than valid reason for doing it.   Triathlon, for me, is the perfect sport and I’m determined not to let it slip until I know that I’ve fulfilled my potential, which my life so far has shown to be expansive.  Watch this space…