Motivational Speaker Miles
Despite going blind in his early twenties, Miles was undeterred and determined to fulfill his dreams, setting numerous world records in the process. He is now a hugely popular motivational and after-dinner speaker, sharing the stage with individuals like Rudi Giuliani (former New York Mayor), Olympic Medalist Roger Black, Jeremy Paxman, Melvin Bragg, and Lord David Puttnam, addressing corporate and celebrity audiences worldwide.
Miles is an exceptional storyteller who weaves together rich anecdotes and humor with powerful life lessons he has learned while overcoming his blindness, making his presentations entertaining, motivating, and inspirational. He uses his experiences as an international adventurer to motivate and inspire others to reach their potential. His words aren't hollow generalities; coming from a managerial background himself, he adapts his messages to the corporate world, offering practical ideas to his audience.
Miles' determination to challenge the barriers of blindness has earned him great respect among his peers and celebrity adventurers:
"I can't even imagine the difficulties of traveling in polar regions without being able to see things. I once was semi-blind in the Arctic and everything became doubly problematic. Total blindness would have been nightmarish. My admiration for Miles is enormous." Sir Ranulph Fiennes
"Miles' attempt to be the first blind person to walk to the South Pole is an extreme act of courage, and I have nothing but awesome admiration for his bravery and determination." Michael Palin
While undertaking extreme endurance and expeditions to deserts, mountains, and polar regions, he has achieved the following records:
- First blind pilot to complete a 55-day, 21,000-kilometer microlight flight from London to Sydney, relying on revolutionary speech-output technology for navigation, accompanied by his sighted co-pilot.
- Man-hauling a sledge over 250 miles across Antarctica
- Completing "The Toughest Footrace on Earth" - 150 miles across the Sahara Desert.
- Climbing to 17,500 feet in the Himalayas
- Climbing Mount Kilimanjaro and Mont Blanc - Africa's/Europe's highest mountains
- Running the 11-day Ultra-Marathon race across China from the Gobi Desert to the Great Wall
- Completing the "Coldest Marathon on Earth" - the Siberian Ice Marathon
- Competing in the hottest ultra-marathon on earth across Death Valley, California.
- Crossing the entire Qatar Desert non-stop day and night in 78 hours without sleep
- Circumnavigating 38,000 miles around the world using 80 different forms of transport
- Setting the Malaysian Grand Prix lap record for a blind driver in a 230kph Lotus
- Setting a new British high-altitude record for a tandem microlight (20,300 feet) with -55 Celsius open-cockpit temperatures
- White-water rafting down the Zambezi River
- Completing more than 40 skydiving jumps
- Cage-diving with Great White Sharks
- First blind pilot to undertake a sortie of extreme aerobatics in a +600 MPH Hawker Hunter fighter jet with an ex-Red Arrows co-pilot
- Becoming the first blind person to do the solo kamikaze skeleton run down the 5G Olympic bob-sleigh track in Lillehammer, Norway
- First blind person to pilot a 340 BHP performance-rated Zap Cat power boat in ocean time trials
- First blind aviator to break the sound barrier - attaining a speed of Mach 1.4/1,060 MPH during a vertical climb to 50,000 feet in just 90 seconds in an English Electric Lightning fighter jet.
- First blind person to participate in a drag-racing event, driving a supercharged machine at Britain’s Santa Pod drag track.
Miles's experience and accomplishments have gained him a lot of media attention, and he is regularly featured in regional and national newspapers, radio, and television programs including the Richard and Judy program on Channel 4, Channel 5, HTV, Carlton, BBC television and Radio 4, Five Live, and the BBC World Service.
Television continues to use Miles' experience to write, create, produce, and present high-quality programs. The Carlton Television documentary 'Against All Odds' covering Miles' participation in the Sahara Ultra-Marathon has, to date, won three international film festival Gold Awards. A second Carlton entitled "Blind Faith" covering Miles' Kilimanjaro climb has already won its first International Film Festival Gold Award.
The National Geographic channel broadcast its two-part documentary on Miles and his sighted guide Jon Cook's Antarctic expedition and will be showing a new documentary covering Miles' world record non-stop crossing of the Qatar Desert.
Speaker Topics:
Benefiting From Failure
Don't Let Your Past Determine Your Future
Dream Big to Achieve Big
Expect the Unexpected
Facing Your Fears
Never Give Up
Taking Advantage of Adversity
The Importance of Teamwork
Keyword Topics: Motivational > Inspirational > Facing Fears > Overcoming Challenges > Resilience > Teamwork
- Global Rolls-Royce Corporation
- John Lewis
- Royal Military Academy Sandhurst
- Barclays
- Europe Pfizer Pharmaceuticals Group
- BP LPG Europe
- Ciba Vision UK
- British Heart Foundation
- Arrows F1 Team
- Brook Hotels
- BAE Systems
- Institute of Fundraising
- TDA Advertising Agency
- Aspective
- Royal Leicestershire Rutland
- Barclays
- Positive Perspective
- Philips
- GlaxoSmithKline
- Jefferson Smurfit Group
- Wycliffe Society for the Blind
- KPMG
- Uniservice
- Enigma Productions