By John Harrington

You might be familiar already with Peter Ryan’s story.

A talented hurler, less than two years after playing for the Tipperary minors his world came crashing down around him when he was diagnosed with Leber’s Hereditary Optic Neuropathy, a genetically inherited form of vision loss which left him legally blind with less than 10 per cent vision.

After a couple of dark years, Ryan eventually accepted his new circumstances and found direction in his life again.

Sport had largely defined the person he was before he lost his sight and once again it became his north star.

After impressing with his testing score on a watt bike at UCD for a Paralympics open day in 2012, he was placed on a fast-track programme and just six months later was a national tandem cycling champion.

He went on to compete in the Rio paralympics in 2016 and two years after that he and fellow Tipperary man, Seán Hahessy, became the first ever tandem pairing the finish the Race Around Ireland.

They completed the 2157 kilometre route over some of the toughest terrain in the country in 122 hours and 33 minutes, and on less than ten hours sleep. In doing so they raised over €90,000 for charitable causes.

Now Peter is ready to take on another huge challenge by running from Malin Head in Donegal to Mizen Head in County Cork in order to raise funds and awareness for the National Council for the Blind Ireland (NCBI).

He hopes to complete the 586 kilometre route in just five days by running the equivalent of just over three marathons on each of those days.

The NCBI is an organisation close to Ryan’s heart not just because they’ve supported him but also his younger brother Denis who a couple of years ago was also diagnosed with Leber’s Hereditary Optic Neuropathy.

“With the flick of a switch that brought the whole family back into that same head-space,” says Ryan of his brothers’ diagnosis.

“Yeah, we had a bit more clarity on the journey, but that almost frustrated me that everyone was a bit more grand about it because I had a bit of a path travelled. But that does nothing for poor Denis, it's still his life, his hopes, his dreams, his everything.

“The NCBI were brilliant to him. What sport was to me, education is to Denis. He was in his third year of biomedical engineering and had a life plan.

“The NCBI helped get him through college and have an employment programme through which they made an introducation to Pfizer, and he's down there now in a post-grad programme.

“He's been able to tick boxes of normality and it wasn't a situation where his friends were moving in one direction and he was being left behind. So the NCBI have been a great support to him. They're a dynamic organisation who are helping people on the ground and I just felt it would be great if I could do something for them.”

The money that Ryan will raise will go towards the development of the country’s first mobile unit, the vision van, which will travel to 150 locations nationwide providing information, awareness, and support services for sight loss and common eye conditions.

“Essentially it’s a mobile opthamology department,” says Ryan.

“70 per cent of blindness is actually preventable if it's caught early. There's a lot of conditions that are preventable and treatable and that's the idea of the mobile unit."

Ryan is keenly aware he’s taking on a punishing challenge that will throw all sorts of physical and mental tests his way.

He’s hopeful the experience of the Race Around Ireland and the hard training he’s done in preparation will stand him in good stead for what’s to come.

“You learn a lot from those events,” he says. “You learn what you need, and when you distill it down what you need is food and people around you who are decent for morale.

“I didn't want to be going back to the same well and ask the same people to get involved to help me, I wanted to let people gravitate towards it and lots of people have reached out to say they want to help in whatever way they could and my employers, Campion Insurance, have been hugely supportive too. When that positive energy is there you let it happen

“I've no doubt it's going to be extremely hard. But if I knew I could do it then I probably wouldn't do it, if you know what I mean. it's definitely scary, but you want that challenge too.

“My biggest training weeks would have been around 160 kilometres a week and on one day I ran 90 kilometres from Drombane to Cappoquin which took me up over The Vee after 66 kilometres so I know the edurance is there and I'd like to think I have that endurance or muscular memory from the cycling that will also kick in. And then it'll turn into survival mode."

Ryan will start his run on October 8 and the plan is to make it as far as Omagh on Day 1, Edgeworthstown in Longford on Day 2, Nenagh on Day 3, Milstreet on Day four, before finishing in Mizen Head on October 12 which is World Sight Day 2023.

“From a logistics point of view I'll have a crew of eight people with me daily,” says Ryan.

“There's a bit of a rotating shift going on. I'll have a camper up the road and I'm hoping to run in either 18 or 20 kilometre chunks. So, I’ll tip away at six minutes a kilometre, that kind of pace, with the aim of every 40 kilometres taking around five hours. I'll stop after every 20 kilometres, rehydrate, get a bit of food in, meet the physio if I need anything looked at, that kind of stuff. And be a bit disciplined then by being back on the road within 10 or 15 minutes.

“That's the best laid plan, I'll do the whole Mike Tyson piece after that and see what happens when the shots start hitting me. Look, I know from training that I'm super confident about Day 1. After that, it'll be how the body reacts.

“The reason we've picked the worst time of the year to do it is because October 12 is world sight day so the whole plan is to try to get down to Mizen for that and hoepfully raise a lot of awareness for a great organsiation along the way.”

You can donate to Peter Ryan's Malin to Mizen Head run in aid of the National Council for the Blind Ireland HERE.