Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
Pub chief who’s a true surfivor
THE boss of pub chain JD Wetherspoon has revealed how he became a surf fanatic after a cancer scare.
Tim Martin says doctors found he had prostate cancer in “the nick of time” and carried out a radical prostatectomy.
“Eleven years ago I had an operation for prostate cancer,” he said.
“I was quite lucky – it was mildly aggressive, but they got it in the nick of time.
“So I’m a prostate cancer survivor.” He was only tested because his father was diagnosed with advanced prostate cancer at the age of 67 and later died.
“When you get to 50 – I was 51 – you begin to realise time is limited,” says the father of four, who has been married to wife Felicity for 35 years.
“If you have a relative, a brother or a father, who has it, be tested, The same for if you have symptons,” Martin says.
The scare prompted him to take up surfing again – a sport he loved while growing up in New Zealand.
Martin, who lives in Exeter, said: “I had 10 years of maybe surfing once or twice a week, which was just fantastic, until about two years ago.”
That coincided with his decision to take three months out to help care for his grandson, who has an unknown genetic condition. Martin has been carrying out repeated exercise sessions with his grandson, who has gone from only being able to roll over on one side to now sitting up.
He still manages to do five sessions a week with his grandson, combining this with being chairman of the firm, visiting at least eight of its pubs each week and being a vocal supporter of Brexit.
It was nearly 40 years ago when Martin, 62, opened his first pub.
He floated the business on the stock market in 1992 and still owns a 31% stake, worth £380million. The firm has grown to around 900 premesis and saw profits jump 27% last year.