Richard also holds a BEng (Hons) in Mechanical Engineering from Swansea University in 1992 and spent the following 17 years as Pilot in the Royal Air Force, serving in both the UK and abroad, including Bosnia, Cyprus and The Falkland Islands. He was a senior Helicopter Captain, Instructor and Examiner in the Search and Rescue Force with many and varied roles, which included media training, major incident command, crash and incident investigation and survival training. He was also Officer Commanding The RAF Sea King Flight and Mission Simulator and was a Human Factors trainer and facilitator.

In his spare time, he enjoys cycling, motorcycling, shooting, surfing and yacht racing which has included skippering a racing yacht in The Fastnet Race in 2005, holds a Royal Yachting Association Ocean Yachtmaster Instructor qualification and has previously served as a school Governor.

Richard has served as an elected member of the Devon Local Dental Committee and of the General Dental Council Fitness to Practice Panel. He is an approachable dentist, is interested in most aspects of the profession including simple orthodontics, facial cosmetics and digital smile design. He has completed an MSc in Restorative Dentistry at Peninsula School of Dentistry giving him increased skills in complex treatments and has undertaken additional training to provide advanced aesthetic and cosmetic dental treatments, including wrinkle treatments and dermal and lip filler treatments. Richard is a clinical supervisor at Peninsula Dental School, and as well as providing NHS and private dental care in a number of different dental Practices, he has also provided out of hours emergency dental treatment throughout the County of Devon.