General News
25 November, 2025
Blind student finds joy and success in EB
Damascus College's tandem vehicle offers a new approach to inclusivity at Energy Breakthrough.
Damascus College’s pedal-electric vehicle turned heads over the weekend, not just for its tandem design, but for its driver who is blind.
Their energy efficient vehicle (EEV) dubbed Road Train brought teamwork onto the track in a new way this Energy Breakthrough.
Up the front driving the tandem EEV was a sighted teammate but up the back providing the power was Year seven student Blake Tonkin who is blind.
“I’m the stoker. I’m shoving all the coal in there,” he said.
While it’s not literally coal-powered, Road Train was certainly motoring throughout the weekend’s 24-hour trial.
While attendees and other drivers might have seen vehicles and turns, the race was an auditory one for Blake.
What he experienced, in his own words, was something between a ride-on mower and a truck.
“You know that humming noise when the blades are on, it kind of sounds like that, and it feels like you’re in a truck,” he said.
It’s a love affair that began for Blake two years ago at a school open night.
Blake jumped in one of Damascus College’s custom vehicles, felt around, and wanted to get involved.
However, while those vehicles weren’t made for someone like Blake, that wouldn’t be the end of his dream.
Alan Strange, who leads the school’s Sustainable Racing Team, seems moulded to take on a challenge like Road Train.
Not only does he have a background in electronics and civil engineering, he previously ran a business that developed equipment for people with disabilities, and he’s taken on similar challenges in Energy Breakthrough.
Mr Strange said paralympic athlete Sam Rizzo, who uses a wheelchair, was a student at the school and competed in the drive-only EEV class in 2014.
“When Blake came along it provided another opportunity to stretch us again,” he said.
“The inclusivity side of it has always been a passion of mine.”
The project began in February after another student pushed to find a way to get Blake involved.
It ended with a steel tandem EEV with seven bike chains “all joined together in different ways” that sets the example of inclusivity for other schools.
Blake’s mum Kate Diamond-Keith said it was great to see Blake get involved, not only on race day, but for the weeks and months of training beforehand.
“It’s been amazing for him to be truly included in a program that’s not disability specific,” she said.
It’s an experience she hopes other kids with a disability will have the chance to share.
“It’s enabled him to be included but I imagine it’ll expand out for other kids,” Ms Diamond-Keith said.
Improving inclusivity Mr Strange said was his hope as well, but is one that comes from an unexpected place.
“It goes back a long way with me to my childhood ... being actually frightened of people with disability,” he said.
“I don’t know why but I was dead scared.”
This changed when, at 18-years-old, he and his brother were confronted with someone who was “really struggling” so they pushed him around in their go kart.
“To see the joy on his face when he just got involved a little bit sort of changed me,” he said.
“From then on it set my life course.”
It’s the same look Ms Diamond-Keith said Blake shared over the weekend.
“He’s just having the best weekend probably of his life,” she said.
Mr Strange said he hopes people understand the value of being inclusive, not just for the person, but themselves.
“To feel the breadth of society can have the same opportunities as everybody else … is a great feeling,” he said.