A mountaineer has set his sights on a Guinness World Record for the fastest time to complete the 721 challenge.
The challenge involves climbing the world’s highest peaks located on each of the seven continents, expeditions across the North and South Pole, and rowing the Atlantic ocean.
It has only been completed once before by a Russian Explorer who took 11 years to finish the mammoth task.
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Nick Hollis, from Maidenhead Road, has already climbed the seven necessary mountains and is looking to beat the record by taking eight years to do the challenge.
Raising money for World Land Trust the mountaineer is keen to help the charity in their conservation work across the globe.
The aim is to raise £250,000 for the charity throughout the campaign and donations are being made on the 721 Challenge Just Giving Page.
A passion for mountaineering has been with Nick since his childhood and he now works full time within the industry whether that be team-building exercises, professional talks, or taking on challenged such as this.
He said: “Once I finished Univeristy and got my first job which came it came with a car I could get to these mountains and from there it was a passion which grew and grew.
“I used to work in the corporate world and using my weekends, my holiday to improve my skill in the mountain and over time the mountains got bigger, harder and higher.”
“Ten years ago I got to the point I couldn’t juggle both so I took the decision to leave the corporate world and reinvent myself.”
“I absolutely love it, going out into those environments developing my knowledge and then coming back and sharing it with others and inspiring.
“I talk to a lot of school children which is amazingly powerful to be able to make some sort of difference educating them.”
Up next for the mountaineer is rowing The Atlantic in September and then completing the expeditions of the North pole in April 2022 and the South Pole in November 2022 through to January 2023.
Nick also suffered from coronavirus last year and leaving him with long-term symptoms that caused uncertainty on whether he could finish the challenge.
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He continued: “I had a really tough journey with long covid and for a long time I didn’t think I could do the challenge.
“I never gave up on it but it was looking quite improbable
“I spent many months complete on recovery getting over long covid but now I’m in a much better place, typically training two times a day
“I’m not fully recovered, I’ve still got a long way to go but I’m much more confident we will be able to get the challenge completed.”
To follow Nick’s journey you can follow the challenge on Facebook here or Instagram here.
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