Rob Trigwell is an international aid expert, currently working for the United Nations in the UK. Rob has spent the last 10 years in the aid sector, having lived and worked across the Middle East, South East Asia and East Africa. Now part of the global operations team for the UN Migration Agency, when there is a global emergency, Rob is part of a specialist team that deploys to help set up the humanitarian operations. Rob’s involvement in humanitarian operations has seen him work in some of the most of hostile environments whilst supporting some of the worlds most vulnerable people. During this time Rob has always maintained his love for the outdoors, having won Jordan’s first official triathlon in 2013, whilst he was working in Zataari Refugee camp on the Jordanian-Syria border.
Having a childhood love for running, Rob is, and remains an active runner, specifically marathon and ultra-marathon distances. In the 2021 infamous Lake District 50-mile race, better known as the “Lakeland 50”, Rob placed in the top 2% of 1200 runners. Beyond purely running, Rob has done countless triathlons including Ironman distances.
For the last 5 years, Rob has teamed up with friends and ventured into winter expeditions. For several years, Rob and friends would traverse self-sufficiently with pulks across Arctic Sweden’s northern mountain terrains, with trips ranging from 120-400km. In 2018, Rob was part of a three-person expedition team to set the winter speed crossing record of Lake Baikal, Siberia. The team of 3 crossed the 650km frozen lake in 12 days, 21 hours and 13 minutes, breaking the previous record by approximately 18 hours. Throughout this trip, temperatures got down as cold as -37, and also saw the highest amount of snowfall in the area for 50 years. Rob has been on a number of winter expeditions, and has his eyes on some north hemisphere polar trips in the coming years.
Rob has always loved the outdoors, being a keen runner, surfer and snowboarder (well in the last few years a splitboarder). Through recreational adventures, or work assignments Rob continues to travel the world, following his passion of exploration.
Robert Trigwell
