Balance Health & Wellness

I have been exercising for as long as I can remember. My father was a Jockey and from the age of 4 my life revolved around ponies. When I left school at 17, to work with racehorses, I joined a local gym, took up running and have never stopped.

At 19 I spent 3 months on expedition with Operation Raleigh in Australia and a further 9 months travelling and working with racehorses before returning home. However, the travel bug never left me and at 21 I flew to America and embarked on an month long Amtrak rail journey around the USA and Canada. The journey ended in Vancouver, where my scuba diving qualifications and adventures began, culminating in a job as an underwater videographer in the Caribbean. 

Whilst living in Grand Cayman, I qualified as an aerobics instructor and on returning home, completed the American College of Sports Medicine health and fitness, advanced personal trainer and exercise and the older adult qualifications and started working in a health club in London as a fitness instructor. One year later, I added massage therapy to my list of accomplishments and became a personal trainer.

Because of a childhood dream, over the next couple of years I trained and qualified for the British Stunt Register and have doubled a number of actors including Julie Walters, Rene Zellwegger and Jennifer Saunders, to name a few. I have performed stunts on films and tv series, including Dr Who, Bancroft and all of the big soaps in a range of activities including abseiling, fighting, stair falls, car knockdowns, fire work and drownings. It's safe to say that no two days are the same and it's rarely boring!

Through stunt work qualifications I spent 3 years on the rescue team for BAs London Eye as part of the breakdown rescue team. I can honestly say I am one of a handful of people who have sat on the outside of the 12 o'clock pod, 135m off the ground admiring the view!
 

At 33 I went to London Metropolitan University and completed an undergraduate degree in Human Nutrition and went on to do my Masters degree in International Public Health Nutrition at Westminster University. A long distance learning diploma in sports nutrition from the International Olympic Committee followed and recently I completed an online foundation course in herbal medicine with the Heartwood foundation, an area of study I intend to pursue.

To bring some balance to an active life I have practiced yoga for over 20 years, with greater commitment over the last 10. I qualified as a 200-hour yoga teacher in 2016 with YogaLondon and have since done further training in yin yoga and yoga nidra. I teach vinyasa flow, yoga core, hatha, yin and yoga nidra and run workshops on movement, yoga and breath work.