Throughout the whole of May 2023 I’m challenging myself to ride 10 miles a day, every day, rain or shine in aid of Guide Dogs UK. That’ll be 310 miles in total - further than riding from London to Paris.

In 2000 I was matched with my first guide dog. I had some residual vision back then but lost my sight completely in 2003 due to a rare form of glaucoma.

I currently have Winter, my fourth guide dog. She’s a beautiful dog both inside and out, but, at 9 years old, retirement for her is fast approaching. I hope she’ll be able to keep on working for some time yet but you never know when the day will come that her harness will have to be hung up for the last time.

Blindness is challenging but it doesn’t have to be. My guide dogs have given me the confidence to get out and about safely and to live my life independently but the charity relies on donations to deliver their life changing work. That’s why I’ve decided to do this cycle challenge.

My cycling challenge will all take place on a static road bike in my garden. Every penny raised will go towards the £35,000 needed to raise and train a single guide dog.

Almost two million people in the UK are living with sight loss that has a significant impact on their daily lives. Of those, around 180,000 rarely leave their homes alone and lead lonely, isolated lives.

Guide Dogs works for a world where people with sight loss are never left out of life, for a world where being blind or partially sighted is not what defines you. A world with enough support to make the challenges of sight loss no barrier to fulfilling hopes and dreams.