'I plan to shave my London Marathon best by days' - wheelchair athlete Claire Lomas on why she will attempt this year's event in motorcycle gear

When it comes to competing in the marathon, Claire Lomas believes she has a unique distinction. “I think I must be the only person who has improved their personal best by a matter of days,” she says.

In 2012, wearing a robotic suit that enabled her to walk for the first time since she became paralysed in a riding accident five years earlier, she completed the London Marathon in 17 days. Last year, in the same suit, she finished the Manchester Marathon in nine days.

“At the rate I’m going I’m on course to overtake Mo Farah by about 2075,” she says with a smile.

Lomas is an extraordinary woman. An in-demand motivational speaker and inveterate fundraiser (her marathon efforts have accrued more than £750,000 for spinal charities), she exudes a beam of positivity. Not least about her latest challenge: taking part in this year’s London Marathon, this time in her wheelchair while wearing full motorcycle leathers and a helmet. The idea came about because she has recently gained a licence as a competitive rider and is planning soon to undertake the Isle of Man TT course.

“When you’re fundraising, you can’t keep doing the same thing, or going to the same people. You need to do something different. But why I chose this I don’t know. People who ride motorbikes know how tough leathers are to move in. Just getting into them is a nightmare for me. It would be a lot easier if I could just ride my Ducati.”

Worse is the fact that the damage to her spine means she has no temperature control below her chest; she simply does not sweat. And in 2018, temperatures on the London course topped 24 degrees.

“I’m going to be drinking loads of fluid,” she says. “Which leads to another problem: I have no control over my bladder. I have a catheter, but I won’t know when to use it. I think I’ll be leaving a trail of wee round London.”

Everything changed for Lomas in 2007. A leading amateur horse rider, she had entered a three-day event in Leicestershire as part of her preparations for that year’s Burghley horse trials. On the cross-country course her horse clipped some low-hanging branches. She was flung from the saddle, smashing into a tree trunk.

“I’d had bad falls before, I broke my pelvis about three years previously,” she says. “But this time I just knew. I was a practising chiropractor, I know how the spine works. From the moment I hit the ground, I thought, ‘I’m buggered.”

Her fears were quickly confirmed: she was paralysed from the chest down. Expected to be in hospital for six months, she discharged herself after eight weeks. And she says the commitment required to be an elite sportsperson was crucial to her recovery: she had long experience of working towards a goal.

“But I don’t want people to think it was easy. Just because I’m in a good place now doesn’t mean it wasn’t tough getting here. My worst nightmare was not being able to move. When it became my new reality, I had to struggle through really dark times. There were many times I wished I’d hit that tree harder and just ended it.”

What changed for her was focusing on the positives. “I had to let go of the things I couldn’t do and start concentrating on the things I could. That’s when you begin to get better.” And the list of what she can do is extensive.

She skis regularly, she rides her motorbike round tracks at over 100mph, she is in the process of gaining her pilot’s licence. Plus she has two daughters, both born after her accident. “The biggest miracle for me was having children. Everything down there still all works, I just can’t feel it. Pain-free childbirth: result.”

She has found a new career too: she does more than 40 keynote speeches every year to corporate clients.

On the day we meet, she is addressing the annual conference of Octavia Housing, the 350 people in the room hanging on her every word, enthralled by her spirit of optimism.

“It’s another opportunity that has come my way since the accident,” she says. “Before it, I’d be terrified of doing something like this. Now I love it.”

She began public speaking after her first marathon, when she undertook a tour of primary schools.

“Kids ask such great questions. I did one recently where I’d mentioned I had no feeling below the chest and a lad put his hand up and said, ‘You mean if I took a chainsaw to your legs and cut them off, you wouldn’t feel it’. ”

But what is occupying her effort now is preparations for the London Marathon, when her husband Dan and a friend called Russ will run alongside her wheelchair dressed as pit girls.

“Honestly, the fuss he made about choosing shoes for his outfit,” she says of her husband. “He’s worse than any girl I know.”

This time, the challenge is to shave another few days off her personal best. Indeed, she is hoping to complete the race within the 6hr 50 min cut-off.

“I did eight miles in 2½ hours yesterday, so it’s doable,” she says. “Trouble is it’s hard finding where to train. I went to Rutland Water, which has brilliant paths for running, cycling, looks wonderful. But it was awful for a wheelchair, the camber was impossible. I was in my leathers and helmet, going around in circles, with all these people looking at me thinking, ‘She’s weird’. ”

Not that a few odd looks are about to stop Claire Lomas.

“The thing about my accident, it means I’ve done things I’d never have done. It’s so easy in life to keep doing the same old same old. This has made me branch out. And there are so many aspects of my life I prefer now.”

If you would like to support Claire’s marathon challenge, please visit viginmoneygiving.com/ clairelomasVLM