Climbers are gamblers, their currency is the weather, the stake is their lives…
Most professional athletes cannot tell you what makes them champions. They simply do what they do, but do it better than most. Michael Groom is no exception to this rule. He is one of the world's greatest mountaineers, climbing the worlds' 6 highest mountains without supplementary oxygen - taking on the mountain on its own terms.
There is something else Michael Groom climbs without - the front third of both feet.
Having failed at his first attempt to climb the world's third highest mountain Kanchenjunga, he returned in 1987 for a second go. He succeeded, but at a terrible personal cost. He lost all his toes and a considerable part of both feet, due to frost bite.
After years of frustration, severe pain and humiliation, that event brought out the champion in Michael Groom.
This is not a mountain climbing story.
It is a story of the extraordinary determination and remarkable discipline that has forged the life of one seemingly 'unremarkable' man.
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