For first time guide runners the thought of guiding someone who cannot see can be scary. Essentially guide running is not difficult, you just have to do what you would normally do while running, be aware of your surroundings. The only difference is you have to account for being at least as wide as yourself and the person you are guiding.

This means any obstacles you would normally avoid, be it a post, tree branch, another runner, all need to be avoided, by taking into account your fellow runner. Of note, is that your fellow runner may be slightly taller than you, so watch out for branches that you may normally avoid!

The other key element is communication, note when you are going to move to avoid an obstacles, and highlight serious dips or raises in the running path. Kerbs and tree roots have to be avoided, this is something that is best worked out ahead of time. For example, do you count down 3, 2, 1, dip, or just say dip! I have found in the past for myself, my guide saying “next step” is enough to forewarn me of a drop in a kerb or a tree root.

Tethering – this also comes down to personal preference. Some visually impaired runners may prefer to be tethered to their guide. This can be by a physical tether that both runners may hold, such as a shoe lace, or simply the visually impaired runner touching the guides elbow. Personally, I rarely tether, instead I can quite accurately track my guide by just running along side, when things become difficult I do reach out and touch my guides elbow.

The overall key is two way communication, the visually impaired runner has to tell you what they personally need to guide, and the guide, needs to give feedback about the surroundings. It is quite simple being a guide, and good communication can make is seem like you are just out running with a friend. People who run with me often forget they are guiding, as after a while it can become quite natural.

Below are a few questions from a guide runner, to give a sense of some common worries.

What if we fail to communicate and you are injured?

Injuries and mistakes happen. As a sighted runner stumbling or bumping into things happens. So as a visually impaired runner I am comfortable with the fact that now and again something will go wrong. This is perfectly fine, its just part of running! If it is a total collapse of communication that causes the problem, this is perhaps a time to have a quick chat on how communication could be improved to reduce mistakes in the future. This has happened to me with a few guides, and it was just a case of working out simpler and faster ways to communicate.

How much do we communicate

Very little, I just need to know which way to move to avoid something and if there is an obstacle underfoot, or the path narrows so I may need to drop behind. Simple and effective is key!

Is there such a thing as too much communication

Yes, I do not need to know all the details of my surroundings, for example, that I am passing a house with a red door, or what type of asphalt I am running on. However, if the guiding instructions are effective, there will be plenty of time to have a pleasant chat, like you would with any other runner. I generally end up having standard chit chat while running with guides, as that is what a sighted runner does, when running with friends.

How do i know if you are happy with my guiding

If you are turning up and helping me I will be happy with your guiding! Beyond that point it is about communication, if I feel I needed more assistance at a particular point, then I have to communicate that. If you are not providing enough information or too little, again it is up to me to tell you.

After borrowing a GoPro camera from a friend and a suitable harness from another, I headed out today to film my classic running route. I was filming the route to add some additional content to an interview I gave a few weeks ago. It was an interesting run as it saw the return to running outside.

Since the birth of my second son I haven’t ran outside, this is mainly due to time constraints. In order to run outside my wife has to drop me off. With another child in the house this was proving difficult, so I had decided to conduct most of my running indoors. The result being a little over 7 months since I ran my traditional route. So there was a nagging question in my mind, could I still run the route? Had it changed? How many things would I run into? – The answers, yes, yes and none.

In order to demonstrate the first time I stepped out onto the dual carriageway I began my run at the closed road. This seemed incredibly apt, for a return to running outdoors. I would begin at the very same spot it did a few years ago. The closed road is simple, you just have to keep one foot on the line and run. It is far easier to only keep your outside foot on the line, this is because if you run central to the lines its difficult to read both feet on opposite lines. Often you can become confused and drift far more than you do with one line to follow. So I quickly breezed up and down the road and returned to the dual carriageway.

I stood on the edge of the curb, paused, then stepped down onto the line and followed the much trodden path. With yellow lines the majority of the distance, it was again easy to follow. My running of the line changes slightly for this section however. As the road is cambered heavily it is easier and safer to run the inside of the line, unlike the usual outside of the lines. It is very easy to follow and much safer as it means you are tighter into the curb, therefore further away from the cars!

The tricky bit arrives when the road meets the path, a quick transition to the path means I have to identify the camber and move towards the curb. This particular section can be tricky as the cambers are not amazingly obvious and there are a few posts. This is the bit I always found hard as both sides of the path are littered with obstacles, traffic lights, junction boxes and fences. The next section involves a slight incline and then some of the more interesting obstacles. If I follow a white line perfectly, I miss about 5 road signs. Go slightly wrong and I hit about 5 road signs. It seemed a little tricky to identify the line underfoot, mainly because its been a while! Luckily I found it and avoided all the signs. Once again its relatively simple – hug the curb for around half a mile. A sharp turn to the left results in a nice straight 0.7 mile section.

The straights can often be where it goes wrong, as there is a tendency to drift. Thankfully this section is flanked by grass on one side and bushes/trees on the other. Well at least there used to be trees! They seem to have disappeared! So in future I must be careful to stick to the grass side and avoid the dreaded drift! I made it back to the car with no bumps or bruises, so an incredibly successful return.

It was great to be back outside, I had forgotten how different it feels to be alone and outside. It takes a great deal of confidence just to keep moving forward. The mindset that there are no obstacles, nothing has changed since last time is difficult to maintain. But perhaps that difficult arrises from it being a while since it was common place. With more practice will come the confidence that running alone is easy. It will only take a couple of weeks!

When I first entertained the thought of running at the ultra distance, I told myself I would only ever run on the road. There is one problem with this however, as not many ultras are run on the road – they are predominantly trail-based events. I avoided the idea of running on trails for as long as I could. But the longer you dream of ultras the idea of running trails comes to the forefront. I decided to bite the bullet and enter a trail race, the SDW50 – a 50 mile run across the South Downs Way.

So I could get used to running trails I decided to enter a half trail marathon – the Osmotherly half trail marathon. After speaking to the race director he assured me the trail could be easily run by a blind runner. Encouraged by this, I linked up with a guide runner from down south and we had arranged to run this race together. I have never run a true trail event, and Braddan had never acted as a guide runner, so this was going to be a true challenge for both of us.

Stood on the start line we were looking forward to the race ahead. We had decided to start right at the back, so we could get used to the guiding without hindering other runners. The race started off on a relatively easy road section, with the only issue being a little ice here and there. We quickly entered the true trail sections and we were instantly hit by the difficulty of the terrain. It was a deeply rutted split track, meaning there were 2 dipped tracks with a raised section in between. Neither track was wide enough for 2 runners, which meant I had to drop in behind. This gave Braddan the difficult job of shouting out possible obstacles I may encounter. We were quickly brought down to a walk for 2 reasons; i) I suck at hills, and ii) the terrain was becoming difficult to describe simply. It didn’t take long, however, until the terrain levelled out and we returned to Braddon giving short instructions of what to expect.

Running through deep puddles and even deeper mud puddles we were beginning to have fun. While the terrain was difficult it remained entertaining and we laughed and joked as we ran along. With pieces of the track narrowing I had to attempt to be as precise as possible while trailing Braddan. This proved too difficult a little way down the trail and my left foot slipped and I began to fall. With cat like balance and dexterity I remained upright, and triumphant in my gymnastic-level balance we plodded on. We arrived at a truly difficult section – a section I remember being warned of.

As a blind runner, in my mind’s eye it felt like we were descending down a trail version of a pyramid. I remain convinced an excavation of the trail would reveal a lost egyptian temple. This section was incredibly difficult and I noted to Braddan that my leg was beginning to hurt, my cat like balance from earlier had come at the price of a little twinge. We plodded on and even managed to get into a little flow of running. The trail weaved in and out of woods, fields and a little road. After a particularly tricky downhill section in the woods we found ourselves in a field. Braddan says it was a field – I believe it was an ice rink. The “mud” as Braddan called it was like sheet ice. I constantly slipped and slid around the rink and we finally reached the bottom. At the bottom Braddan gave me a choice – run through a river or take the bridge. This seemed like a no brainer. Let’s take the bridge!

With my first step onto the bridge I nearly fell, saved only by Braddan managing to give me an arm before I fell. We quickly decided running through the river was the better choice. We continued running and made reasonable progress until another uphill section through the woods. As we went through a gate we found another pyramid. This time we would have to ascend it – walking up a pyramid is just as hard as coming down one! After a while we made it to the top, only to discover it was the start of a big climb. The hill was far too difficult for a novice trail runner and a novice guide, so we decided to walk. Around this point all the quick runners began to pass us by. Somehow we had been reasonably close to everyone as the turnaround point was around 1 mile away. We believed everyone must have gotten lost and that is why we had made such a reasonable time. After a lot of plodding and becoming the last 2 runners in the race we reached the turnaround point. So now we had to do a lot of it again!

Running down the hill we got into a really good flow, we had shortened the guiding communication down and we were running/walking smoothly across the top of the hills. We were quickly brought down to earth by the descent and Braddan fell over. Now I saw he fell over – I might of pushed him a little, I assumed he had cat balance! Arriving atop the pyramid, we now had to descend it – this is where it all fell apart. My twinge had now turned into outright pain. I was struggling to put any weight on my leg and from this point we had another 5-6 miles. Determined, I wanted to move on.

Our speed had reduced to a crawl, I was struggling to bend my left leg. I was beginning to hoddle when a marshall arrived, “are you injured?” Me? No, of course not! However, this lie couldn’t be held up for long, as the marshall said they would come along with us to the finish line. It only took a couple of hundred metres before I had to admit to being in quite substantial pain. I had assured her I wanted to continue and she seemed happy to let me push as far as I wanted to. While attempting to numb the pain with a little fast walking we had become lost, as it appeared had a whole bunch of other runners. After realising our mistake we doubled back – a little disheartening to discover you have gone the wrong way when injured, but this was made a little easier by the fact that so had everyone else!

Arriving back at the ice rink was my first real challenge. I was unable to bend my leg while ascending or descending and the rink was on a slope. So only able to bend my right leg I hobbled to the top. Arriving at the top of the rink there was a nice undulating section through the woods. A great chance to push the walking pace and numb my leg. This proved a great idea and we began to make decent time. I was quickly brought back down to my one legged shuffle when we arrived at a series of steps. Unable to manage the pain effectively I had to continually rest. However, this simply made the problem worse, for every time I stopped the pain would just increase when I started again. I told Braddan and the marshall not to let me stop again, no matter how much I complained about the pain. After 4 steps I said we have to stop it’s too painful. Sticking to their guns they didn’t allow me to stop, and I made it to the top after a few minutes.

This gave me a further opportunity to numb my leg – with an undulating surface I could pick up the pace and stop my leg from hurting. Worried I wouldn’t make the cut off I began asking the time constantly. The marshall assured me I would be allowed to finish even if I missed the cut off. I put on a brave face as I entered the checkpoint and made it through – I grabbed a handful of Jelly Babies with the idea I would reward myself every so often to keep me going. It was a slightly different route to the finish and this involved an enormous climb. I could only return to my one legged shuffle, and so it was taking me a long time to ascend this short section. The pain was now obvious on my face as other runners began to comment. I say my face, but it may have been the fact I was shouting out in pain. A very kind runner stopped and offered me his hiking poles to help with the ascent. I gratefully accepted them and continued my shuffle. By this time the pain was at the point of unmanageable, but I still had a few miles to go. I had already told myself I would finish, I just now had to continue to push. Reaching the top I rewarded myself with a Jelly Baby. The route continued to undulate and I had brief moments where I could numb my leg intersected with deep mud holes that brought the pain back. I continued to motivate myself with a Jelly Baby here and there.

After a short while another runner passed by and asked if I wanted some pain relief. I replied with “give me everything you have!”. Thankfully he was a nurse so gave me the appropriate dosage rather than me popping numerous tablets. I swallowed the pills with a Jelly Baby chaser and continued on. The route continued to be difficult for me with me stumbling over rocks and becoming stuck in the muddied track. I kept asking if we were close, I was assured we were, so I plodded on. We arrived at a field which the marshall proclaimed – “Oh, I forgot about this bit!”. Perhaps we weren’t that close after all. Leaving the muddy field I ate another Jelly Baby, but I was now getting low, I had to ration from this point on. I could feel the surface underfoot beginning to harden, I knew we couldn’t be too far from the village and the finish.

After a short while we turned a corner onto a road. This meant the finish was close by, I ate my penultimate Jelly Baby and decided to keep my last one for crossing the finish. Dodging a few cars and weaving in and out of the road and pavement we arrived at the finish line. I limped over the line, ate my final Jelly Baby and picked up my medal. It was only then I realised just how slow I had been moving, for the last few miles I had been averaging just over 1mph. My straight legged shuffle had been a long fought out slog to the finish. I was happy just to get to the end and importantly learnt some valuable lessons along the way.

The margin of error running the road can be measured in metres, the margin of error in the trail is measured in centimetres. One misaligned foot fall had caused me to stumble down a gradient and hampered my ability to compete. It taught me that if I am to conquer trail running as a blind runner I really need to tighten up how I run the trail. I think the only way I can achieve this is with a dedicated trail guide runner. That would give us an opportunity to develop a guiding relationship where the communication can be distilled to a couple of words and we both know exactly what that means in terms of me avoiding obstacles, While I spend the next week or so healing I am going to take the opportunity to realign my trail goals for the next year, with the aim to develop my ability on such terrain before entering the ultra trail distance.

I would like to say a massive thank you to Braddan for guiding me along the way and Kerry (the marshall) for letting me finish despite the limp. I would also like to thank the anonymous runners that stopped to help with equipment and pain relief.