Five-time paralympic medal winner shares journey at library book signing
At the beginning of this month, five-time Paralympic middle distance runner and five-time medalist Jason Dunkerley stopped by the Gaynor Family Regional Library to share his autobiography Visions of Hope, Running Towards My Own Truth. The book details his journey as an athlete travelling around the world as well as his life starting out in Northern Ireland and moving to Canada as a child. In addition to being a talented runner and author Dunkerley is also a musician and played some of his music for the crowd.
After being introduced, Dunkerley spoke about his writing journey which started in about 2019. From the beginning, it took him a few years to get the manuscript finished up and then another year for publishing to take place so the book itself has just recently been published about 3 months ago.
“It’s really great to be starting to share it with people. The title is Visions of Hope, Running Towards My Own Truth. It’s a book about running and the highs and lows of being a competitive runner who’s blind, having had the great privilege to compete at the Paralympics, and representing Canada over 10 years as part of the national Paralympic athletics team,” he said.
He explained that though the book does focus on his running career it also goes into depth about himself as a person as well as his other interests beyond running.
“I really try to just tell the whole story. Growing up, I was born in Northern Ireland in the late 70s and grew up in the 1980s during the Troubles in Northern Ireland. And so, I talked about that. I have two brothers and a sister— two younger brothers who also have a congenital eye condition, just like I do, called Leber congenital amaurosis,” said Dunkerley.
He talked about how he and his brothers were very interested in sports from a young age.
“We loved to listen to sports and follow soccer and track and field and cricket and all the sports that are really big in that part of the world. We also liked to adapt a lot of our own sports. With soccer, we would tie a grocery bag around a soccer ball so we could hear the ball when it was coming towards us, and that enabled us to play soccer in our own adapted way,” he said.
Dunkerley made the journey to Canada in 1991 when he was 13 years old when his family made the move together. He explained that it was a difficult transition for him going from one country to another but that he discovered running in high school and then continued to run in university.
“I made my first national team just from increased training and being in an environment that really challenged me to get better and that was the beginning of my international running,” he said.
Because this book is about more than just his running journey he does have certain themes that he explores as part of his story and loss is one of them.
“Learning to lose as an athlete, lose races and lose gracefully. One of the examples I write about in the book is my first Paralympics, which were in Sydney, Australia, in 2000 and just the experience of competing in the final of the 1500-meter race against other blind runners. (I was) leading the race most of the way with my guide runner and then got passed at the end,” he said.
Dunkerley said that it took him some time to realize he didn’t lose the race but had in fact won second in his first Paralympic games.
Other themes of loss that he explores are the loss of important people in his life like his mother and brother.
The book is dedicated to Dunkerley’s mother who always supported him in whatever he wanted to do.
Another theme that he has chosen for the book is relationships. One very important part of Paralympic running is the relationship that develops between the athlete and the guide runner.
“For me, running has always been kind of a team sport, in a way, and setting a goal to be in a race and the accountability that each of you brings,” Dunkerley said.
Another theme that Dunkerley wrote about was running as you age and experience life. At one point he experienced a car accident that he had to recover from.
“Coming back to that accident and having to train in a very different way to be able to be competitive again that was another stage. I also donated a kidney at one point too,” he said.
Dunkerley ended the presentation by showing a video of an important race which he won and talking about the strategy that went into that race as well as the hard work put in by himself and his guide runner.
He also had Joannie Habs help out by reading some passages from the book that highlighted the themes of the presentation.
The presentation ended with a musical performance from Dunkerley and a Q and A session.
Dunkerley’s book Visions of Hope, Running Towards My Own Truth can be purchased at yorklandpublishing.com/titles/visions. The book is also available to borrow at the Gaynor Family Regional Library.
