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In association with Adventure Peaks, I am going to be climbing Mont Blanc for the British Heart Foundation!

I will arrive in Chamonix in the French Alps on June 20th for a one-week training course and I will also be acclimatising to the high altitudes - Mont Blanc at 15,780 feet is more than four times higher than our highest mountains in the UK.

After this we go for the summit. Using head torches, we set off at midnight (when the glaciers are frozen) with crampons and ice axe. We have to pass through the ‘Valley of Death’ with falling rocks, and roped together we will be traversing steep snow covered slopes with two kilometre falls to the bottom. Yes, I am very apprehensive…… 

Why am I doing it? I am 62 and a Professor of Cardiac Electrophysiology working in the medical school at the University of Manchester. When I was 50, I had a TIA and like many older people I then discovered my blood pressure and cholesterol were too high.

All of this was a wake-up call. As a scientist, I know the importance of exercise for the heart and blood vessels, and I am now trying to stay fit by walking or cycling to work.

For about 10 years, I have had the ambition to climb Mont Blanc, Western Europe’s highest mountain, and for the last three years I have been training by climbing the mountains of the Lake District, going on mountaineering courses in Scotland and most recently by following a training programme at my local gym.

Throughout my long career, my research on the heart has been supported by the British Heart Foundation and I decided that climbing Mont Blanc is an opportunity to give something back! 

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