Daughter’s tribute to her father and the charity than helped him

A vision-impaired woman from Doncaster will run the London Marathon this April in memory of her father for Blind Veterans UK, the national charity for vision-impaired ex-Service men and women.
Sharon Maughan, 44, is determined to raise as much as possible for Blind Veterans UK because of the support the charity provided her father Thomas Maughan for 22 years. — A vision-impaired woman from Doncaster will run the London Marathon this April in memory of her father for Blind Veterans UK, the national charity for vision-impaired ex-Service men and women. Sharon Maughan, 44, is determined to raise as much as possible for Blind Veterans UK because of the support the charity provided her father Thomas Maughan for 22 years.

Just like her father before her, Sharon Maughan suffers from retinitis pigmentosa, a hereditary disease which slowly causes sight loss. For many years, Thomas Maughan, who served with the Royal Air Forced in the 1950s, was helped by Blind Veterans UK, until his death last year.

Ms Maughan, 44, will run the marathon in his memory, after taking up running with her dog Lochie.

She said: “Blind Veterans UK did so much for him and he was incredibly involved in the different clubs. He went to their Brighton centre for holidays and he had different types of training including IT and cooking. He was also part of the archery and bowling clubs. I’m incredibly grateful for the support they gave my father and felt I needed to give something back.”

Ms Maughan was registered partially sighted at the age of 22 and was registered blind in 2008. Before her training, she hadn’t run since she was 17 but she feels so passionately about raising money for Blind Veterans UK by running the London Marathon she has gone back out again.

She has joined the Doncaster Pacers running club, who are now helping her with training and arranging a guide for the challenge.

Ms Maughan added: “I used to love running and did cross country competitions. It’s good to get back into it and it’s great to run with people from the Doncaster Pacers as you get to meet different people each training night.”