Amputee takes on thousands of miles for charity

Rob Wilson, 31, and his Siberian husky to cover equivalent of 12 countries

A Dundee amputee has set himself a challenge of walking more than 9,000 miles to raise money for a mental health charity.

Rob Wilson, 31, has attributed a country to each letter in “mental health”, such as Madagascar for “M” and Ecuador for “E”.

He tallied the length of each country, a cumulative total of 14,865km, and is going to walk, run or cycle that distance.

Rob, who has played for Scotland’s amputee football team, will use his daily exercise during lockdown, with his Siberian husky Aria, to reach the target.

The other countries are New Zealand, Trinidad and Tobago, Argentina, Latvia, Haiti, Egypt, Albania, Lithuania, Turkey and Hungary.

Rob has been posting daily updates on his GoFundMe page, where he hopes to raise £1,000 for the Scottish Association for Mental Health (SAMH).

He said: “Aria needs a lot of walking so I thought I would set myself a target.

“During May I gave myself a personal challenge to complete 100k either walking, running or cycling.

“Being an amputee is not the easiest so at times I walked and ran with my crutches and I completed that on Saturday.

“I then decided with exercise time being more important during lockdown to do another one, but longer.

“I’ve got family all over Dundee, so it’s an excuse to go see them, without going into the house of course, and make up some of the distance that way.”

Rob has completed about 42km and hopes to finish the challenge by the end of the year.

Rob lost his leg below the knee at just a few months old and had to have more of the limb surgically removed in his mid-20s. While he does not suffer from mental health problems himself, he said living with physical disabilities does offer a glimpse of what it can be like to overcome mental anguish.

He said: “I know people, some nearest and dearest, who are impacted by mental health. It is a tough time for people being on furlough as well so I just want to do my bit.”