With a potential role as godmother to the royal baby and a dashing new beau, Pippa Middleton is riding high as she celebrates her 30th birthday on 6 September and is still as much in the headlines as ever. But if you thought you knew absolutely everything about the much-photographed girl in town think again. HELLO! has unearthed a few surprising facts about Kate Middleton's sister.
- Pippa sets herself a major physical challenge every year. In the past, she's climbed Mont Blanc, sailed the Atlantic and competed in the world’s longest cross-country ski race in Sweden and tackled the Coast to Coast triathlon in New Zealand involving 150 miles of running, cycling and kayaking.
- The ultimate foodie, she loves sushi and used to get her flatmates, who included George Percy, heir to the Duke of Northumberland, and Lord Ted Innes-Ker to help her prepare it in front of the TV at Edinburgh University.
- Unsurprisingly given that the sporty socialite is always courtside at Wimbledon, her favourite drink is Pimm's. "Oversized sunglasses… mean I can nod off unnoticed after one too many Pimm’s in the sun," she says.
- Watching cricket is another of her passions. In her September column for Vanity Fair she outs herself as a "boundary babe" and "former cricket WAG". Pippa waxed lyrical over the game's great players including Imran Khan and the "tradition of the sultry cricketer powering in from the boundary, tousled hair blowing in the breeze, his whites signifying a purity of action".
- The Duchess of Cambridge's sister has a wicked sense of humour. Talking about one of her ski races she said her rucksack was very heavy because it contained "a Cheltenham fur hat, various other bits of clothing that PR people have sent me, and several signed copies of my book Celebrate" - before listing all the mountain equipment she really had in it.
- Now that her sister is married, she is the sole user of a version of the Middleton coat of arms reserved for single women. Like the rest of the family, it features three acorns, signifying Kate, Pippa and their brother James – but it has a tied ribbon at the top to show her unmarried status.
- She once gave a shout-out to a spoof Twitter account which has been set up in her name called @pippatips.
- Her best friends are language teacher Alice St John Webster, from Marlborough, and Camilla Campion-Awwad, who now works for her father's plastic surgery practice.
- In 2012, she was named in the Time 100 list of the world's most influential people.
- Her favourite designers are Alice Temperley, Roksanda Ilincic and New York-based Misha Nonoo, who is a personal friend.