John Adrian Tremayne Rodd was the younger son of Gustaf Guthrie Rennell Rodd, a Commander in the, and his wife, the former Yvonne Mary Marling, a singing teacher and co-author of Singing, the Physical Nature of the Vocal Organization His father was the younger son of the diplomat and Conservative Member of Parliament Sir Rennell Rodd, who was created Baron Rennell in 1933. His father"s elder brother was 2nd Baron Rennell.
On his return, he was educated at Ladycross School and Downside School.
Rodd was evacuated to the United States during the Second World War. He followed his father in joining the in 1952, and joined Britannia Royal Naval College in Dartmouth. He later served in the Home Fleet, the Mediterranean Fleet and the Far East Fleet.
He also played for the Barbarians.
He played most of his rugby in England, for London Scottish, Plymouth, and the Hampshire rugby club In the 1960s he was a key player in the London Scottish rugby sevens team, winning the Middlesex Sevens tournament five times from 1960 to 1965.
He started to scale back his rugby-playing activities in 1965 and finally his amateur rugby career was ended by a ban for working as a freelance journalist on a British Lions tour in 1966, writing for The Observer and The Scotsman, which led to a ruling by the International Board that he had become a professional. Rodd left the in 1962 with the rank of lieutenant.
After leaving Morgan Grenfell, he became a director of Marks of Distinction, a company that created sporting medals and trophies and put on sporting and corporate promotional events.
He left to run his own trophy and sporting promotions company, Tremayne Limited, from 1978 to 1984. Rodd actively participated in many sports including. Rugby for several Parliamentary teams, cricket, golf, bridge, backgammon and chess.
He also played in several backgammon world championships.
Rodd died of cancer in London, aged 71.
He was the boxing champion of the Home Fleet in 1958, and played rugby for, Combined Services and United Services teams. As Tremayne Rodd, he won 14 caps as a scrum-half for Scotland between 1958 and 1965, battling for his place with Stan Coughtrie and Alex Hastie. In 2000 he was the team leader for Vladimir Kramnik in London when he won the World Chess Championship from Garry Kasparov.
He was a member of the Scottish team that shared the Five Nations with Wales in 1964.
