AFTER A LIFETIME OF THINKING IT COULD NEVER HAPPEN FOR HIM, NEIL AND FRIENDS SET OUT TO BAG A MUNRO-ON A HANDCYCLE.

WORDS NEIL RUSSELL

PHOTOGRAPHY PETE SOULLION

One of these bikes is easier to get up a Munro

One foot in front of the other I keep telling myself. I'm losing them. I'm only halfway up and the sun is burning, the sweat dripping off me. Why are they going so fast 7 Why can't I keep up7 I know why I can't keep up. I'm never going to be able to keep up.

"We can stop here. I'll tell the others just to go on and we can either rest for a bit and keep going or we can take our time and go back down to the minibus and meet them there. This is a huge achievement already; it doesn't always have to be about getting to the top," said my Dad.

It doesn't feel like a huge achievement. It feels like another confirmation of the things I can't do and would never be able to do. Another example of how I am different to everyone else. It's the summer of1999 and I'm in the Air Cadets. My Dad is doing his best to keep my spirits up and help me see things through a more positive lens. All I know is we're halfway (if that) up Ben Lomond, not at the top of Ben Lomond and I'm a teenager who has lived his whole life with a physical disability.

Born with spina bifida I have problems with my right leg, meaning I have trouble with walking. I constantly get sores and have very little muscle tone or sensation in that leg. All I've ever wanted is to be like my peers. Keep up with them, do the same things as them, go the same places they go. I've always hated spending time with other kids and teenagers with a disability. It just makes me feel more disabled.

We go back down. We get in Dad's car. We go home. Hills, mountains, getting out to the more remote adventurous places ... it's not for me.

Well, that was a bleak start to this story. It gets better. I promise.

Testing the latest integrated tool storage?

Do you think we'll all fit in this plane?

Swimming is miserable, but bikes ...

Getting up hills and out into those beautiful remote places that you see on social media and N really didn't Feel like places that were ever meant for me. That all started to change when Iwas in my early thirties (nearly ten years ago now). In 2015 a friendtalkedme into having a go atmy first-ever para-triathlon. It was to be my only paratriathlon.Inaively thoughtitwouldn'tbetoo tough. I'd been a swimming teacher for about four years by then and as soon as I got in the pool at that triathlon, I realised the saying "Those who can't do, teach" is abundantly true.