Graham takes Chiefs logo to new heights
By Mark Stevens
30/5/22
Exeter Chiefs member and season ticket holder, Graham Keene, has already taken the club’s new logo to literally new heights, after he recently became the oldest British climber to scale the notorious Mount Everest.
The 68-year-old grandfather of five from Exeter beat the previous record held by Sir Ranulph Fiennes, who was 65 when he reached the world’s highest peak in 2009.
The ardent Chiefs supporter set the record following a 16-day “flash” expedition, conquering the mountain which stands at 29,000 ft, with his German guide Luis Stizinger and sherpas Kunga Sherpa, Ang Kaji and Lakpa Thinduk.
Upon reaching the summit at 6:30am on May 13, Graham unveiled a new Chiefs flag – given to him by club chairman and chief executive, Tony Rowe OBE – as well as a picture of his grandchildren.
"It was a magnificent feeling," he said. "There was lots of anticipation about what was to come. The weather, the team, my body, but I was just happy to be back in the mountains with great people.
"We spent a night each in four camps. On summit night, we left the last camp at 8.30pm, arriving on the summit the following morning, where we spent thirty minutes at the top of the peak.”
In 1998, Graham and his two sons Ben and Daniel climbed Mount Kilimanjaro and he has since had a burning interest in the mountains. Graham climbed the highest point in South America in Aconcagua in 2004 and since his retirement, he has climbed Mount Vinson in Antarctica in 2017 and Cotapaxi in Ecuador earlier this year.
In 2018, he came close to summiting his first 26,000 ft peak. But with not enough guides to help him with the final climb, he didn’t meet his goal. He made it his mission to complete the climb, but knew that he needed a different approach if he was going to succeed at his age.
After training frequently throughout the pandemic, spending hours in the gym with a personal trainer and going on long hikes through the Devon countryside, he felt ready to tackle the peak.
Typically, these expeditions take several weeks to complete due to regulating the body for thin air. But from the comfort of his own home, by using a hypoxic tent, Graham did this a different way.
Removing oxygen from the tent, along with being able to adjust the altitude, his mental and physical state was left in top shape ready to tackle the mountain.
Son Ben explained how his father would go for long walks with weighted packs on Dartmoor, Exmoor and the South West Coast path, where he also a trustee for the organisation.
Graham is now one of the top 20 oldest successful climbers of Everest, according to the Himalayan database of those who have attempted the daunting trek.
He was born in 1954, a year after Sir Edmund Hillary and Nepali sherpa Tenzing Norgay achieved the first-ever successful Everest climb.