A Mansfield man who lost his sight because of a rare eye condition is planning to run the 2016 London Marathon.
Nathan Edge, 21, has suffered sight problems from the age of six but became completely blind suddenly last year.
He’s since been rebuilding his life by finding new ways of staying active and will run the 35th edition of the marathon on April 24.
He will be helped by a guide, Peter Jones-Hall, who himself is partially sighted.
The duo have already raised £4,000 for the charity Guide Dogs, which helped Nathan by giving him Hudson, his yellow Labrador cross golden retriever.
Nathan said: “It will mean the world of me to raise funds for Guide Dogs as I want others to have the same support.
It beat me at first, but then I beat it
“Losing my sight in February 2014 made me have to work hard to get my independence back and just learning to live my life like the way I should be doing like sighted people.
“I wasn’t prepared to lose my sight and it was devastating; it beat me at first but I eventually managed to beat it.
“Back when I was younger I used to be very active and I needed that in my life which is why I challenged myself to run the marathon.”
Video: Watch how Nathan and Peter use a guide rope to run safely together
Peter will be running his first London marathon as a guide runner for Nathan and is looking forward to the challenge. The duo run together while both holding a short guide rope, with the direction and distance set by Peter.
He said: “The buzz will be all of those people supporting us and we’ve already got a lot of local support so it’s going to be amazing.
“Guide Dogs got in touch with me looking for a guide runner for Nathan and here I am. It was a little bit intimidating at first as it was a new experience for me not having been a guide runner before but straight away we clicked.
“My job is to keep him safe – most of the time we just run in a straight line though and it’s just two lads talking about football.”
Nathan is appealing for sponsorship through a Just Giving page.
