Even though university is keeping me incredibly busy I have began to think about a new running challenge. The Championship next year is a definite but I now feel the need to find something else.

I think this comes down to now realising the 100 mile run is definitely possible. With my limited training this year I was able to make it 83 miles, so how hard can that next 17 be? With another 8 months of training I am hoping not to hard.

So I have begun to think about a multi day event. I don’t really want to announce my plans yet as they are far from confirmed. I am going to email a few people and see if I can even afford to do a multi day event.

But the sheer thought of planning for my next big challenge is beginning to excite.

The blog has been quiet for a while but rather than a lack of things to blog about I have just been too busy.

Adjusting to university has been a lot harder than I had anticipated. With the commute to university being the first time I have used my long cane it has been taking its toll. I perhaps rather wrongly assumed people would be forgiving of me using the cane and be polite. This turned out to be wrong.

Today for example as I boarded the tram someone clean kicked my cane out from me. No apology they just looked at me and pushed by me. This unfortunately happens on the majority of commutes. On the flip side about once a week someone is actually helpful and assists me with something.

With the rush hour commute being difficult I decided to make a few changes to my timetable to ease the process. Thankfully i didn’t enjoy the module I dropped to ease the commute. So I suppose it did all work out for the best.

While I begin to get my studies under control I have been thinking about next years ultra running. I am definitely entering the UltraRace Championship which will see me return to the Cotswold 100 amongst many other races (90 miles in Jan I best get training!) I have begun to think about other challenges.

I have never been fond of the multi day event but the past few weeks have been thinking about how far I could run in a week. 210 miles seems perfect achievable so could I run 280? push it to 300? I have a few destinations in mind and some interesting point-to-point runs. Just need some funding! (or sponsorship!)

University looms just around the corner; I am still a little anxious about starting university there are just so many unknowns. One of the biggest for me is the commute.

Historically I would adjust the commute so it was absolutely minimal. In the early days when I worked retail, I would catch the bus just after or at its terminal so the bus was empty. This would make it very easy to find a seat and negate a lot of the issues with transport. Fast forward a few years and jobs and I lived literally next door to where I worked, totally removing the commute.

My commute now consists of, being dropped off at the train station, a train then a tram. The journey to university is relatively simple, my wife points out the right train and I board it. Finding a seat is still an issue but I can stand if I must, The tram journey is also very easy, I board the tram and the terminal and there are only two trams, one takes me to the right destination, the other relatively close. So if I go wrong here no big problem.

The issues arise on the way home, I can’t see the name on the tram so I have no idea if I board the right one, the same goes for the train. So I am forced to rely on asking any bystanders if they know where the next train or tram goes. Not the most ideal situation but needs must.

I am also conscious of moving around the campus and the studying itself. Having never studied at this level before I am unsure of the adaptations I will have to make to succeed along the way. All seems a little ad-hoc at the minute, I am confident I will be settled in and know what I am doing within a few weeks. After all everyone at university is in the same boat, its somewhere new and scary!

I also have an ultra coming up in a few weeks, so best start upping the miles. Nothing like adding to the pressure!

The past year my life has changed dramatically. Perhaps the most important I became a father. In an effort to make my life challenging I also decided to start a new career path and begin training to become an ultra endurance athlete. I began all of these new ventures in the same week; just to compound the pressure!

Now nearly a year later I have begun to reflect on where I am and how the public image I have created is perceived. My public image is created around the fact I am a blind ultra runner and to a further extent the fact I train solo outdoors. As I begin to reflect on this public image I am a little uneasy.

What image am I creating of a disabled person? Am I utilising my disability as a PR stunt?

It is these two questions that are currently making me think. When I began my journey to compete at the ultra distance I had never thought about the public discovering what I was doing. So when did that change?

It all changed when I realised how expensive training for an ultra had become and I needed to reach out to companies for support. This is where I made the choice to market myself as a blind ultra runner. I am now wondering how the public at large perceives this. I hope people don’t perceive me as constantly marketing myself on my disability in an effort to gain support.

It is such a fine line to walk; I don’t think I can escape the moniker of a blind ultra runner or if I even want to. I hope the message that does come across is the ability to adapt. That’s my core belief and the reason I own this domain name. I constantly adapt to overcome barriers and that is the message I really want to project.

I think right now I am just a little confused about the entire situation but that could be related to the opportunities I have been granted. In the past year I have appeared in magazines, newspapers, live television, international television, books and I now have a TV commercial about my running. It is difficult to process how far I have come in such a short space of time.

Perhaps the uncertainty is a good thing, as I will constantly remain thankful for the opportunities I have been given. This post has perhaps been my most scattered in a while but it is basically how I feel about the situation. I am becoming far more conscious of how I project myself and being careful of the message I carry.

However perception is always down to the individual, so knowing how people perceive my story and process it will always be personal to them. The one thing I will always be vigilant of is to not label myself beyond the boundaries of who I am. I am blind, I am an ultra runner, I am a father. Any other labels attached to myself is down to the individual.

Today during cane training I was finally awarded my own long cane. Before you can be presented with a cane you have to show the ability to navigate safely as well as know a few key movements of the cane.

In reality I mastered the cane a few weeks ago but have been a little to busy to meet up and finalise the process. Today we hit a few of the routes I plan to use when commuting to university as well as practicing a few road crossings.

Crossing the road is always dangerous when blind as frankly there are too many crazy drivers! But we headed to a busy road instead of picking the quiet areas so I got a feel of what it is really like rather than spending my time crossing easy roads.

This was also a great opportunity to try different tips for the cane. I have decided to use the rollerball tip, which is basically exactly what its namesake implies. An enormous rollerball. It glides over surfaces far easier and snags less, making walking on rough surfaces such as paving slabs easier.

Today was also a great change to try out some speaking alarm clocks and wristwatches. Now the watch I actually want is a black faced TW Steel but I cant afford it right now. Money is constrained so I may end up with a cheap ugly RNIB watch. Not looking forward to that but needs must.

While I continue to train with the long cane I am also incredibly interested in using a guide dog. I love dogs and really like the idea of having a little buddy with me when I go out.

To progress through the process I attended an introduction day where you get to handle a guide dog and have a little chat with a reasonably new guide down owner.

I arrived at the centre and was met by an enormous german shepherd; quite rare in the guide dog world. It was the largest german shepherd I had seen and we used to have them as family pets! As we waiting for another person to arrive we chatted about guide dogs in general and their capabilities.

After the other guest arrived we headed out to have a trial run with Lola the german shepherd. I was nominated to go first. The instructor had chose an incredibly busy street with a number of obstacles to demonstrate what the dog was capable of and see if I was willing to allow the dog to lead. In order to keep it safer the instructor also had the dog on a leash while I held the harness handle.

With a simply instruction of forward we were off. The first 20m or so felt so strange, the dog moved at a fast pace, far faster than I could navigate alone. The dog weaved in and out of the pedestrians and obstacles and I quickly found it easy to understand the dogs movements and follow along.

The one thing I seemed to keep forgetting to do was praise the dog, you have to constantly reward the dog be it verbally or through a treat to let it know its doing a good job. But apart from that I felt I was doing incredibly well. After a few more basic commands and crossing a couple of roads the instructor decided to release the leash and let me have a go solo.

The dog picked up the pace and we were off zooming down the high street. Lola was able to identify possible obstacles in the distance and noticeable slowed as she calculated the best route. The dog overall performed excellent right up till we returned to the car. As Lola spotted the car she bolted and pulled me along!

I really enjoyed my experience with a guide dog and look forward to hopefully passing my final assessment next week. Then its a case of waiting a long period of time (upto 18 months) to be matched with a dog.

Navigating around as a blind individual you generally rely on routes. I have memorised many mental maps on how to travel to most important places I visit often.

For attending university in september I am having to add a large number of routes so I can travel solo. I had been mapping these routes out mentally for a while. I have been to the routes once or twice so repeat them in my head so when I use them again I know exactly where I should be at what point.

This week I visited one of the main routes to university with my rehab officer. Incredibly confident I could simply use the mental map I had created I zoomed off. After negotiating a few corners and crossing 2 roads I knew I should arrive at some steps. But I couldn’t find them.

I was a little puzzled and asked what was going on. Turned out there is some building work going on and all the pavements are now temporary structures in the fenced off road. Dammit just when I thought I had this down!

It is a simple change but highlights just how difficult such an occurrence can be to deal with. I only have to walk out of my way by around 10 metres but if I had encountered this on my own it could of been a few minutes for me to figure out how to navigate through this new maze.

But practice makes perfect!

As the run approaches I have also been continuing with my cane training. I am pleased to say I have mastered the majority of the techniques and was praised for being so competent so quickly.

The cane training came at an odd time as attempting to run a 100 miles does not seem to go hand in hand with mobility issues. This contrast has been interesting as the skills I have acquired through running and training alone translated incredibly well to using a long cane.

It turned out the techniques I had developed on my own where the actual techniques used to navigate with a cane. A strange coincidence indeed! This allowed me to quickly progress through my training and become proficient with the cane in an incredibly short time frame.

On todays lesson a student accompanied me and my rehab officer. The student had to ask if I was indeed blind as I moved around so well. I laughed and confirmed I was and told her she should come see me running alone!

Despite becoming proficient with the cane my training is not complete. We are beginning to work on set routes I will utilise on a daily basis. So we will be practicing boarding the train and tram I will use to get to university. I am really looking forward to this as I see it as a fantastic step forward in regaining my independent mobility,

It has all been a little quiet over here recently about my running. Well there are 11 days to go till I approach that start line and run 100 miles.

I still plan to broadcast the race live through RunKeeper and I am currently maintaing a separate blog for the occasion. Blind100

The race starts on the 24th of June at 1200GMT the broadcast will start a little earlier and that just to make sure everything is functioning correctly.

So what condition am I in? I am coming off the back of a little bone bruising but I am ready as I can be at this point. The training miles have been put in I just need to bring my A game on the 24th and log those miles!

For a number of years I have been putting off cane training.  I had developed a system to navigate that during the time I felt was acceptable.  In hindsight all I had really done is stopped going out on my own.  I had restricted my travel to assure I was always accompanied by someone else.

I had decided a month or so ago to start the training but I was waiting for my request to be processed.  Finally last week I met for my first lesson with the cane.  Mobility previously caused a large amount of anxiety, while I was able to navigate in known areas I was still incredibly anxious and navigating around in unknown areas was incredibly difficult.

Beginning to use the cane I instantly dropped this anxiety as know I was sure I wasn’t going to walk into anything.  I was now able to walk around at a consistent pace at ease.  I had been resilient of the cane as I would lose my anonymity and I would instantly be identified as blind.  However while utilising the cane this thought never once entered my mind instead I was focussed on the instant difference it was making.

I am continuing my lessons with the cane and will chronicle my progress as I go.  Its week or so till my next lesson however as the intructor is on her holidays.