Learning How to Run Again with Mobile and Cloud

Share this post:

I had it all planned out. We’d hike to the top of Half Dome in Yosemite and I’d propose to my girlfriend, Sian, at the top.

The only problem was, climbing up steep, rocky ledges when you’re blind is not the safest date activity. The rocks were slippery, and one small misstep could mean death. So at the halfway point we had to turn around. It was the first time in my life that I had to give up because I couldn’t see. From there, I made up my mind that I would never quit anything again just because I was blind.

The next step was to get in shape when I got back home to Rossington, in South Yorkshire. Since I couldn’t afford a gym membership, I needed to find a way to run outside – on my own. So I bought this fitness tracker app for my phone called Runkeeper and headed to the soccer pitch behind my house. I positioned myself between the goalposts and just started running up and down the field, using the app to see how fast I could go.

For the most part all went well. But it wasn’t long before I needed more space. Plus, the pitch was becoming a bit more hazardous, as moveable objects, like dog walkers, often stopped me in my tracks. They thought I could see; I thought they would move.

That’s when I moved my runs to a closed road near the local airport. And that’s where Runkeeper came through for me again. This versatile little app was designed to help runners and walkers keep better track of where they’re going, how fast, manage what they’re listening to, to build in challenges, and much more.

But the feature that really got my attention was something called Audio Cues that gives runners audible alerts at specific distances on their run, and which the runner inputs himself. It’s meant to help people with things like keeping pace, tracking distance, and so on. But I thought I could use it for something more practical: to track obstacles, like telephone poles, construction sites, hills, etc. In other words, I thought I could use it to navigate.

I’m told that the technology behind Runkeeper is a combination of application smarts from Runkeeper, mobile app development from IBM MobileFirst, and IBM’s database-as-a-service, Cloudant, that lets Runkeeper manage and scale clients’ mounting information in the cloud.

Since those days on the soccer pitch, I’ve taken Runkeeper to the street and beyond, to 10K races and marathons, like the New York Marathon, and even a 100-mile race – training like a maniac and pushing myself further and further.

Running is not an involuntary exercise. You have to want to do it. And if you’re physically challenged you have to want it a little more. I like to think that I used some great cognitive innovations in an innovative way to get to this point. Repurposing tech. But I’ve also had a lot of help and support along the way. Especially from my wife Sian, to whom I did ultimately propose and marry.

___________________________________________

Stay close to Simon by reading his blog: http://www.andadapt.com/ and check out an audio interview at the Meet Simon page.