About Me

This is probably where I'm meant to bare my soul and put something deep and meaningful, but I'm quite a simple chap really.

I was born and grew up in Cambridge, am half-Armenian, used to play tennis relatively seriously and have always loved sport, travel and adventures. Once my junior tennis "career" (I use that term very loosely, there were a lot of much better players than me) came to an end, I started getting into running and obstacle races as tests of endurance and because, to be totally honest, giant playgrounds are fun.

Climbing Everest is something that I had privately mused about doing for many years (seeing it as the ultimate endurance challenge) and on turning 30, thought that it was about time that I did something about it. With that in mind I took myself off on an expedition across the South Patagonian Ice Cap, loved every minute of it and that confirmed that this was a dream worth pursuing. I therefore started to put in place a 4-5 year plan with Adventure Base and Jagged Globe to get me ready for Everest, going on multiple mountaineering expeditions and privately guided trips to increase my experience between then and now and choosing not to buy a house in order to afford all this.

Then, as an interesting hiccup, I was diagnosed with Ulcerative Colitis in November 2017. The first thing I asked my consultant (having just been violated with an endoscopy to diagnose me), was whether it would stop me climbing Everest. He said no, so I got my head down, cracked on with regaining my fitness and have tried not to look back since.

With any luck, I'll successfully make it up and down Everest this Spring (with Jagged Globe) and can hopefully inspire fellow Colitis or Crohn's sufferers (particularly those who have been newly diagnosed) that anything is still possible with the right attitude and support network. With any luck I can also raise a bit of money for Crohn's & Colitis UK too!

Finally, I should also mention that my employer, the John Lewis Partnership, has been very supportive in giving me the time off to pursue my dreams here, so thank you JLP.