Efficiency. Accuracy. Commitment. These are all words that John struggles to spell – it’s the double letters that confuse him. The kickboxing Manager of the Hathersage store, he combines rugged good looks and a cheerful “can-do” attitude with a penchant for lying through his teeth in online bios.
Climbing-wise, John can accurately be described as a jack of all trades and master of practically none. He has dabbled in what he describes as “winter stuff” which no doubt featured sledging rather more heavily than climbing and has a gritstone ticklist as long as his arm, which is only getting longer as more guidebooks come out and less actual climbing gets done. His hardest bouldering ascent to date is a font 7a at Curbar that everyone knows isn’t actually 7a really.
One of John’s greatest achievements was actually completing the Lakeland Trails Marathon following a hardcore six-month not-really-training plan of running maybe once a week and eating a lot. Further abroad, he’s visited Nepal and Morocco on trekking expeditions and had one solitary trip to the Alps that he mysteriously refuses to discuss any further...
When he’s not busy brightening the shop with his sunny demeanour, John can be found tramping the hills of the Lakes and Scotland with his significantly better half, Gemma and dog Beau at his side. In what little spare time he has left, the self-styled “least academically qualified person at Outside” is attempting to better himself with distance learning courses in business and law. Busy guy. Oh, and he’s scared of sharks. Who isn’t?