Conor O’Donnell: The British Motorbiker
When Conor O'Donnell was 12, his life was completely upended when he woke up to searing pain in both his feet. Seemingly from out of nowhere, he'd developed a condition known as neuropathy. Defined as damage to the nerves outside of the brain and spinal column - so your legs and arms, feet, hands and so on, Conor went from living a normal childhood to facing years of agony, watching as it affected the muscles in his legs to the point that he could barely walk. All of this whilst it went undiagnosed.
Six years after it first started, he was finally diagnosed and whilst his friends were making plans for their gap year, Conor started the first of four surgeries to help restructure his legs.
Although he's still affected on a day to day basis, having found a world of motorbikes, a world that gave him his independence back, he's now pursuing a career in content creation. But before we get into that, I asked Connor to take us right back to the beginning and to set the scene for us.
Conor O'Donnell 1:15
So I grew up in Bromley. So for those who don't know Bromley, it's about 14 miles south of Central London. I lived there all my life and in terms of where I went to school a place with Dulwich College. So I'd get the train into school every day with my brother, walk down to the station - Shortlands is where we lived - hop on the train, go there and Dulwich is a beautiful school. It's an all boys school that dates back to the 1600s where it started off as just a small little eight person college, actually in the centre of the village. It expanded and now it has around 1500 pupils. So that's from year three all the way to year 13. So I did my entire time at Dulwich. And then from there went to study at University of Sussex where I did engineering. I'm the first in my family to explore that industry because my parents are lawyers.
Mark Warman 2:04
And is engineering something that you can trace back to when you were growing up?
Conor O'Donnell 2:08
Absolutely. Yeah, from the moment…well, pretty much first memories, yeah, I'd be taking things apart rebuilding things. I'd be out in the garden where we could stay with little toys when I was a kid. And that evolved from you know, Lego through to connect through to Meccano, to just actually taking apart the lawnmower and seeing how it worked and understand what their function was. So I always enjoyed that and different to my brother, I'd always watched my dad work so if there was ever a task that needed to be done in the house or in the garden or on the car, I'd always want to get involved try and help my dad out passing him the tools learning about that. And I think that just all from there was nurtured, nurtured, nurtured until I got to my GCSE’s and decided to do design technology along with maths and physics. So all started to paint that picture and paint the journey for what I wanted to do. So from a young age, I always wanted to go down that engineering route. And then yeah, actually started so at Uni, I took mechanical engineering. And I was thinking is this actually the side of it I want to do or do I want to do more with the design aspect rather than actually the tinkering. And so I did, I changed over into the product design side of engineering, and graduated with that. And sort of It's funny how now things are changing. Because that original side, the tinkering and taking things apart, has started to reconnect and sort of my inner child has realised that I've missed that. I’m actually now starting to explore that again, in the world of motorbikes. So it's nice to have sort of gone around full circle.
Mark Warman 3:45
So what's keeping you busy right now?
Conor O'Donnell 3:47
So very nearly finished building my girlfriend’s bike. Julie, my girlfriend has just learned to ride - she's got her full licence now. So I just finished building her a Yamaha VR 125 and this was a bike which had been sitting dormant for goodness knows how many years. It was a complete wreck which I was able to take ownership of, and just stripped it apart and tried to make it my own and make it this unique piece of engineering. And I did need help along the way so Julie’s Dad helped me, my Dad helped - people on Instagram or social media, whenever I was getting stuck, let's put our little story here. They're asking a few questions. And it's amazing to see how what this bike has become. So you know, to actually say I've taken this apart and built out has been has been pretty incredible and has definitely reconnected me with why I wanted to do all of that in the first place and why I did Design Technology at school and why did the certain bits and pieces for from uni as well. It's nice to have repeat to be revisiting that.
Mark Warman 4:45
Yeah, I bet. I mean, I found the same thing, especially with Instagram and how willing to help people are and I almost feel like my projects are bigger than me and they're really their community builds.
Conor O'Donnell 4:57
I can see that. Yeah, absolutely. And you know, I suppose they're all bits and pieces where I think back to it and think I would never be able to do it had that one person not go back through to spend hours going through forum trying to find the right answer and just so happened that one person had the exact same problem and to experience it before they were able to help me there and then and it is kind of anything it would be nice to one point when the bike is properly roadworthy and it's been emptied and Judy's insured to maybe take it somewhere and for people to see it. This this is the bike that you know kind of spent a good year and a half during the pandemic trying to build with moms or moms off so it's nice it would be nice to show the finished article to everyone and then to actually be like I kind of helped build this bet I remember helping telling you about that bit there so absolutely see the community coming together
Mark Warman 5:45
Yeah and I think it's been what 18 months of not having people around us so any opportunity we can take you know it's worth grabbing onto but that was that was a lockdown build right?
Conor O'Donnell 5:54
It was it was everything had started so I used to live in Battersea and that's where this bike was sitting dormant for goodness knows how long with a big big layer of dust on it, it was completely caked and I was able to then get that bike in the back of a van it all been approved by DVLA and police and whatnot hadn't been bought stolen, got it back home into my garage and that's when it all began I had no idea what I wanted to build I had no plan or my training or my education of engineering had gone out the window of actually planning on being a delegate and detailed about it later to strip the whole thing apart didn't even know if it ran it didn't know the field it was goodness hose out or how old and just just started tinkering away and as I go along this picture My mind has started developing developing I was like that No, that doesn't look right this I want that to be that's too long. That's too short. I want to cover that here and one of the tools I had rituals and many and death definitely in no way professional means I was able to build what is something I'm very, very happy about and puts a huge smile on my face. And Julie when she she sort of takes the just around the little gravel bed outside. Even she's loving it so fast. I can't wait to actually see her properly on it, enjoying it bathroom together.
Mark Warman 7:08
And just shifting gears slightly before we started chatting. I like most people I read your bio, and I saw that you're recovering from neuropathy and reconstructive surgery. And I assumed that all of that was as a result of an accident. But that's not right. Is it? No,
Conor O'Donnell 7:23
No, that's what most people don't see. And when look, first of all, many people don't even know what neuropathy is. So they do them for vanko. It could be something to do it can come off a bike or injuring yourself on the bike. But no, the two are very, very far apart. And the bike came after the neuropathy. So yeah, you're absolutely right. It's a perfectly healthy young boy, played rugby played sports incredibly fast. You know what I even saw myself doing a future in rugby or in athletics. I was that kind of speed. And then actually one day woke up in the morning and I was in agony. My mum came running into the bedroom, I was screaming my head off. And I was around 13 at the time 1213. And it just felt like someone had taken a huge shard of glass or a knife and just stabbed it into my foot into both feet. And it was even to this day, I remember the pain vividly because that pain didn't subside for seven years. So from that 80 onwards, it was just nonstop agony pretty much and I learned to deal with I learned to cope without a lot of coping mechanisms. Singing one of them is one of those ways that was around it. But yeah, I just had to get over my life. No one knows where it came from, or how it came about if it was a mechanical injury because I never broke my leg or broke my feet or did anything. It literally just started up one day. And after seeing all my goodness, countless countless countless professionals eventually met a chap when I was 18. And he said this is neuropathy, which is inflammation of the nerves. So literally the nerves themselves become inflamed and damaged. But anything can cause it it's very weird stimulus. And he said, the only way you can treat this is with surgery, we can't actually do anything for the pain it will hopefully subside and burn itself out and thank goodness it did. But it left a lot of scarring in the sense that I couldn't walk properly, my whole gait deformed my whole potential future of playing rugby sprinting went out the window pretty much instantaneously because I struggled put one foot in front of the other. The gate as I mentioned changed and in doing so because of muscle wastage, you name out, my legs started to deform and how they look and if you looked at me, there was most notably a deformity I walked on the side of my feet. So rather than being heel, toe, heel toe flat footed, I sort of curled around from the heel all the way to the sort of the other, I suppose the ball of the foot, just by the by the toes curled around on the outside. And so those deformities meant my bones my muscles weren't being used correctly. There's an imbalance there. And pretty much yet I just had to I was taught a whole new way of walking, I had to use something called an fo, which is an ankle foot orthotic. They're big, horrendous chunky bits of plastic which are made moulded to your feets to help show and walk, then themselves walking on solid plastic. So that in turn brings ulcers and pain. It was definitely an interesting one that all my friends would still be running and still be playing sport that academia wouldn't be affected in the slightest. Whereas pretty much me I'll be in hospital every other every other week, trying to figure out what was going wrong. So yes, I did start to struggle with my my sort of studies.
Mark Warman 10:38
Yeah, and what I didn't realise was that it was a number of years before you actually got diagnosed, wasn't it?
Conor O'Donnell 10:43
It was, yeah, for all that time, multiple, multiple different diagnoses there. So it's that it looks like this, it looks like it could be this. None of which are correct. So every time I'll just go ahead and go over and do the treatment and nothing of work. And if anything would be getting worse, I'll be in constant pain. And it's just the deformity is the fact that my feet changed shape. They weren't what used to be that even if I wanted to try and run for the bus, I physically couldn't if I wanted to try and do these things. And the most difficulty I had of it is how dependent I became on others. And I think that's something I still am trying to counter today. The fact that I did have to rely on my parents drive me everywhere, or rely on people to give me this because I can drive myself or the fact that I just couldn't get from A to B as quickly as other people. So even getting from class, there was a five minute gap between class knowledge but only longer than that or it needs more my lessons to be pretty much in one room because I won't be able to get up and down the stairs here it was it was this bad. And a lot of people when I think they think back they go You weren't that bad, surely not. I don't remember what it was like because I hit it. You know, stiff upper lip, young gentlemen, that kind of thing. That's the way Dalits raise you to be. You hide it, you don't you don't showcase these things and show off about it, you, you just get on with it. And that's what has always been the word being brought up as well by my family. You just you just do these things you get on with life. So I could have been in the worst possible pain imaginable. And a lot of the time it was and I'd be at the back of the classroom or something literally wanting to cry my eyes out. And I physically wouldn't let myself because I didn't want to show weakness in front of my friends and my teachers and all of that. So a lot of those traits came through and have made me who I am today. So there's a lot of a lot of bad things that I did to myself mentally. I did have my ways of escaping so I used to sing as well. I actually joined choir called Libera and toured the world with them and do those things and even those, we get concerts in front of 1000s 10s of 1000s of people and we'd wear special clothes made for us and stuff and even the footwear would become difficult so I'll be walking along and even walking onto the stage i'd realise my gait would be worn wrong I would just be so embarrassed and thinking no one knows what you're going through people are really judging Why is this guy walking like that Why is he walking desire to see why is he stopping it sort of those the kind of things that are most difficult to come to terms with and think Don't think about that or everyone get into a habit of just be walking along and think somebody's staring at my feet and I became quite violent not I'd like attacking people but I've been away staring at my feet like just just stop staring on my feet like I've got problems that is I don't need you just stare at them and that was something that had horrendous issues with him which I think back and it makes me very upset as to you know how aggressive I'd get it just because people generally would be like what was wrong of your feet but they didn't mean it in a malicious way but I've been through so much pain on my life already that I swore I can't have any more people just drawing attention to it.
Mark Warman 13:46
I imagined that as a young man I mean that must have been incredibly frightening to have your life impacted like that and to see your gait change and to be in that level of pain and but what I didn't realise was that there was such a long gap between it starting and you finally getting a diagnosis and of course something like that is gonna change you but do you think you've learned what you can Are you still struggling with some of those demons?
Conor O'Donnell 14:10
I definitely think there are there are demons agents don't need to tackle and remove and you know I'm all for going through therapy and talking to people and trying to actually really diagnose what what may be holding you back in life I still feel I'm in 29 now and there are definitely things so this started over half my life I've been having this over half my life and I there are definitely things i don't think i feel i ever came to terms with thought like why me Why did this have to happen? Why is everyone else's gets to carry on and be fine but it most definitely did change me but I feel right now as a person is giving you that mindset there's there's a way it could be worse. You know there are always things that that you don't know what someone's going through. And when I am talking to someone of RAM engaging in something, it's very, very easy to put a smile on and pretend that everything's okay on the server. face when deep down it could be a lot a lot a lot worse. And there's a whole thing about mental health anxiety depression, goodness knows it could even lead to suicide all that kind of stuff I get why people go down those those ruts and fall into those rights and life can become so bad because I myself I'd never got to that state where I wasn't depressed and suicidal thank goodness but I did think Am I gonna have to put up this religion in my life and we're never gonna be able to walk properly. If I have children one day am I ever gonna be able to play rugby with them and throw a ball around with them and go running and teach them how to do these things and I'd be having those sorts of a teenager and that is those kinds of things which start to actually eat at you and make you think you need to get better you need to overcome this you need to find a way around this you can't be an invalid you can't be helpless and dependent on everyone else the rest of your life you're you've gone from this young active boy to you cannot do anything so yeah, it's it was difficult. And I would say there are definitely things I still need to address and probably should actually be going to talk to someone about to get to get by but it was definitely hard work my family as well though, so I can imagine your mom seeing me like this perfectly on boy becoming this this not disfigured but just not being able to walk and do a doobie It was difficult my dad my brother and sister they're very supportive again I don't ever really understood how bad it was they may have done we've never really sat down as a family and spoken about it which is to think back over it we've never really had that opportunity but it's something I've been I've been battling all this time and was always scared of even sort of getting a girlfriend you know it changed me in the sense of I went from a very extroverted young man to an introverted I don't want to go out because I'm scared people gonna look at my feet I'm scared I'm gonna get bullied and scared someone's going to take take the Mick out of me because the way I walk so that it affected me and I you know would stay in most times and just be a bit of a gamer and be my own little world and then you need thankfully I had these operations had the surgeries things started to change the pain wasn't there and I was able to sort of the the embers that were left of who I was originally I was able to catch them and try and turn it around and become who I am today. So I try and remain positive about these things. And yeah, I'm always happy to talk about it
Mark Warman 17:28
And so the surgeries that you went through were they to reduce the pain or were they to get you moving again?
Conor O'Donnell 17:34
The latter. Yeah, so because of the deformity my bones had literally changed shape my they're pointing my heel was going to completely shifted itself to the wrong to not sit directly under my foot, it moved itself to one side, the tendons just weren't doing their job they were weak and just not actually engaging. So I come in how long the operations with table surgery to take about four four hours I think five hours that was under and it would literally as the surgeon put out his carpentry were cutting the bone here and we're then fixing it here with with with a titanium plate and we're bolting this bit here in both this bit here and we're cutting attended here and wrapping it around and putting on a different fixing point to try and shift your foot back to be a tripod. rather than sort of a byproduct of all things I was walking on just two parts of the foot rather than putting all my weight through the centre. So proper carpentry and I love the way they say carpentry it's quite funny because I can imagine that I see that property of all at all this obviously just is cutting away and doing these bits and they start from the right foot and that that took about six months to recover and then I went in for the left leg the left leg was immediate success and is my stronger of the two legs right now my right leg still gives me a lot of problems unfortunately. So I had to have surgeries a couple of times and then there was complication with titanium and they're worried about that had to go under again to have the titanium removed once having had set so it just sort of is never ending sort of just death what's going on why why's it never just a simple solution just this fixes this and then I can be on with my life. It was always oh this is now and then there's another complication another complication. But thankfully, as they predicted it did burn itself out the body did whatever it did and one day I woke up and I wasn't in pain anymore. And I didn't say I just had these this sort of mental physical scarring and it's something I still do now so I still see a specialist every now and then to try and help and I still do bits and pieces myself but my feet are still deformed there's still a hell of a lot of scarring on there. I can't move my ankles really past a few rain few degrees of motion they're pretty much locked in place and it was going to get to the point if the operations out of work they were actually going to fuse my feet so I would have been like a Lego man just walking around. Which again, when they when they said that to me I just broke down in tears in front of everyone that I cannot be this person I will not be this person. I will make this work one way or the other. So yeah, just just had Push through so it's given me that mentality just keep on going and keep on going and keep on going. And you know now I do go for jobs with my girlfriend and I do a lot more I ride a bike or drive a car I can I can do a lot more than probably what most people can do because I've been determined to get to that and not let these stupid injuries stop me from being who I want to be.
Mark Warman 20:22
But I'm guessing that at one point especially with the damage to your ankles, you couldn't drive a car could you?
Conor O'Donnell 20:28
No so yeah, everyone was it 17 years 17 years old, so lower sixth form. So becoming a man hit it hitting all those hit hitting all those bits and pieces. And everyone else is learning to drive now I was still getting the trade in school and being dependent on that and I didn't mind getting the trade but I just wanted to be able to do so much more and then even at university people had their cars and would be doing bits and I just again was still either getting a train to and from Sussex with my parents becomes PML of bits and pieces and it's kind of like feel like I should be doing this myself this is it's one of those checkpoints in life that you that you achieve and I'm just not able to do any of this so it definitely felt like my teenage years when relived later on in life I sort of did everything later and everyone but yeah the whole wanting to drive manual because I grew up being a bit of a petrol head just cars films you know any Formula One you name it any sports as obsessive as obsessed with self obsessed with power and the the combustion engine does what it can do. Thrust all that so you know, land speed records, you name it. And so when the time came to be wanting to actually learn to drive I was adamant and learning and manual and just could not do it. Because I couldn't move my ankles. I couldn't move my legs properly, I didn't have the strength to push down. I literally don't didn't have the strength to push the pedal down, which is just ridiculous. Because how many pounds of fresh does it take to move a bed or so and then I was thinking automatically Even then, just for the right foot, the right foot was still really bad. So can even do ortho. So yeah, it all just went out the window. And I again, I felt very, very defeated and deflated. And just, this is really starting to get on my nerves. Now. I've been suffering this for five, six years at that point. Now I can't even drive like whatever horrors Do I have ahead of me. So it wasn't pleasant.
Mark Warman 22:17
And I don't think anyone who hasn't gone through something similar would be able to even imagine what that was like. But at some point along the line you got into bikes.
Conor O'Donnell 22:28
You're right. Yeah, yeah. So biking had always been a forbidden thing. It was very taboo subject. In odonnell household. No one had ever ridden a bike. Nobody had been interested in riding a bike. I think my uncle my dad's side, likes them but never got his licence never actually owned one. But I remember growing up anytime most byword was pasty on on a road my mom went up screaming is a no never in a million years I will never see on the back of a bike or riding a bike. Unfortunately got to the point where like my whole life has been so sheltered I need to kind of stop being a man. And yeah, watching films Mission Impossible was Tron the famous scene going through the back of the tunnel we're getting there resonates with me and of what these are awesome. And my girlfriend Judy said one day want us try it, you know, ci her dad's a big patch head as well and his bikes coming out his ears and cars coming out as is. So she had known about motorcycling from from a young age and she had been a pillion from a young age. So why not give it a go? What's the worst that can happen? You can't do it. And we'll figure something else out. So I spoke to my brother him and I and one of his friends arranged to go to a learning school wouldn't when we didn't, I was living in that time. And literally jumped on a one to five first time seeing by no idea what I'm doing where the gears where's the clutch What's going on here? And isn't up down motion. So it's Yeah, it's first neutral, second, third, fourth, I thought okay, well, I can't just knock it up, like most people, but if I bring my whole leg up from the thigh, if I actually move in the knee, this actually works, I can actually with that strength, pull the gear lever up as to which gear it should be. So again, if anyone ever sees me riding, you're probably thinking why is he lifting his leg up rather than just knocking it down and up, that's my physically still can't do that with with with the injuries I've sustained. So I still actually have developed my own motion of going through the gears. It does sometimes mean I miss a gear and like swearing. Just embarrass myself in front of everyone. Oh, bugger. But I developed my own way of doing it and yet to so again, that came about because I was working down in Horsham at the time for a company down there. So my time respecting working in Horsham and working in Waterloo with their two offices. And the week was split between those two locations and what was i 2022 at that point 23 at that point, and still didn't have a driver's licence still had been dependent on people picking me up or jumping on public transport. And I just had to think I can't do this any longer because the HR people at the company, were just saying you can't rely on others to get you here. Like, it's your responsibility to get here. Fortunately very understanding at all situation. And I thought, Well, okay, so if I'm gonna do a 40 mile commute down to work every day, I can't do a car can I do on a bike, the lecture assumes I've got my CBT licence and was able to get that one to five went to the nearest dealership picked up on that motorcycle because I wanted something that looked cool, and had nice little sounds picked up and not long rule one to five feet of Steve McQueen with the black tank and the red bench, the brown bench seat, and extra nails getting up and jumping on a bike and going down the a three and a 24 down to horseshoe rainbow unable three times a week. And it just so happened that I did buy CBT in like September or or something like that it's starting to get a bit colder, a bit wetter. So pretty much from day one. I've been thrusted in the deep end, and I've been riding in the rain and getting used to the ice and all the different elements at the UK by the furrows that year. So yeah, so properly thrust in there. But it I think that was one thing it just made me connected at so much more because all of a sudden, I have my independence back I could go to go to the Sainsbury's or waiter is down the road and pick up some stuff in a backpack and not need to get public and the things that would have taken hours before taking a matter of minutes. So yeah, it just connects with me. And it was just a huge, huge, huge relief. I even now have the smile on my face the feeling inside of me that warmth, it's just, it changed me. It completely changed me. I feel once in my life I felt independent and something which I was happy with. And I think that's why motorcycling in the world motorcycling has just completely taken over and just dominates everything I do now because it was that it was that something went right for once, everything to go wrong. And it was finally a bit of golden light. And actually, no, this is this is this is this is you. This is you getting through it.
Mark Warman 27:06
And this world is your focus now, isn't it? I mean, if I if I open up Instagram, I can see you're pumping out a lot of content there. have you managed to make a complete switch over to content creation now?
Conor O'Donnell 27:17
Not fully I would love to and absolutely every day I'm aiming to get to that point where content creation is is everything that I do, that's my bread and butter that that is how I I make my living. So at the moment, I'm still doing some freelance work here and there for for friends to help them out. Because by nature by trade, what I've got myself into, I didn't do engineering. My first job outside of uni was a sales job, and I just stuck with it. So did sales and budgets for as long as I can remember. So to this day, I'm still helping out with sales and partnerships for friends. But it's been quite useful because I've been able to use that skill that I picked up, reach out to companies reach out to brands and say, Look, this is who I am. I go by the British most biker, this is my backstory. Would you be interested in working together in one way shape, or form and sort of tying it all together? But uh, yeah, I think I've finally found the thing that wants to do in content creation actually makes me happy because I've been through a fair few jobs. I never really liked maybe this is the problem I had, I picked up myself, but I never really enjoyed having a manager. And if I had ideas and wanted to put forward those ideas, and they were just dismissed, I really feel deflated. And just fill in some work environments. I'd be like, I'm really am trying here and I'm just not don't feel like I'm being listened to. So now it's sort of be my own boss being controlled everything to if I want to give something a go, I can if it fails, okay, I've learned from that lesson or try something else. But I just never felt I had that flow and that positivity when I was in these desk jobs sitting behind a desk from goodness over hours. And over some jobs are beginning they're sort of past seven and finishing at 630 or 730, doing 12 hour days, just on the phones, just cold calling cold calling cold calling. And they have made me happy. Yes, I made some good money from it, but he never connects with me. And that's why I kind of feel like the introduction of bikes into my life, introduction of the contents, the focus and getting out there. Seeing the world is I think that secretly be my dream all along as to what I want to do. And if I can incorporate bits and pieces from my my life beforehand, whether it be the engineering, whether it be the sales side, I think they're all just adding to who I am as a brand and helped me get further in life.
Mark Warman 29:26
And are you taking those photos yourself? Or have you managed to rope someone in?
Conor O'Donnell 29:29
Well, right now I'm trying to do that myself. But I'm very fortunate that Judy has actually been taken in for me all this time. So as I mentioned with her just being a pillion from a young age she loves being on the back of the bike, she wants to ride herself she's got her licence now just needs a bike. So very fortunate that sometimes it just be riding, even if it's just an evening ride or free. Go on quick weekend away together on the bike, and we'll jump off, take a few shots, and then I've been teaching subs to the editing. So that's been a really fun journey. So I'm doing more of it myself. Yeah, Julie now has her own she started her own business during the pandemic. So she physically does not have the time to be snapping wife anymore. So it again it strikes me on the deep end, but it's nice to know that we're both we have been supporting each other in our own disciplines. And yeah, now I'm just trying to do that for myself.
Mark Warman 30:18
Yeah, and I was gonna ask what is it about content creation that you really enjoy and then kind of on the flip side of that, what is it that you find most challenging?
Conor O'Donnell 30:27
It's not all sunshine and daisies, but I think it's it's actually really show me this is how I perceive things it's how I perceive beauty. So you know, I love to still get involved with cars, even as bikes, it's seeing it from my perspective, the the angle that I look at that machine, that's how I perceive that looking at that shot there. And photography, you can do that of course all photography is largely subjective, but I've my particular way of wanting to showcase that to the world. And it's just a nice way of being able to do that you're getting a particular angle or getting a particular setting and location and the particular edit, and just how it can bring that photo in that shot that machine so to speak to life. So that's a very exciting things you're working on is nice being controlled and just to be like okay, I'm just going to jump on the bike now and go do something and I can work my day around things where I need to reposition as I need to of course, the daunting factor is the fact that you don't have an income a steady income at a monthly basis being paid on the 27th of every month or something and what it normally is so that's why I haven't fully made the transition across yet because although I have started to actually make some money from this which is incredible and I didn't expect that to be happening so soon it's not for Julie and I to actually get out and buy our own place and set forward for our careers so that's why I still help out friends here and there but I know and I can feel it in my heart that this is the right thing to be doing and her doing her fashion me doing this we are going to get to where we want to be in life and then this is pushing pushing baby step longer in the right direction.
Mark Warman 32:03
So where do you see yourself in the future? You know, you're the sort of people who have a five year plan or you know, given that we've just come out in the midst of a pandemic Have you got like a one or a two year plan or is it just more kind of you know, fly by the seat of your pants?
Conor O'Donnell 32:19
I mean it it's still with most bikes still want to be doing thing I mean, I've started recently we launched via YouTube and getting a feel for it have really found what I want to do yet but so far the videos I've been putting out metres flogging to myself and talking about it so we did a tour of to Kathy that was one of the collaborations I arranged. I went to the south west coast of England and went around that was beautiful nine day tour. So I've been slowly releasing that information. And then those those stories and videos and it's nice to documenting it But yeah, I mean, I was still very much like to be involved motorbikes I'd like to be maybe involved with cars incredible, I actually had my own real persona as the British most biker and that became more publicly known and publicly aware of people like British motorbikes got a new show or he's actually got a whole YouTube thing who knows how far I can go but i'd absolutely love to everyone grows up and sees these three idiots on Top Gear having a life I love love them to bits love them to bits everyone sort of deeply wants to be doing that so who knows maybe working with other people and doing stuff together but not just on cars or on bikes but just a bit of everything encompassing all but it really is the world's my oyster that's the beauty of at the moment I can go anywhere with this and what works works, what doesn't work doesn't work. So I feel very very privileged to be able to be able to be doing this as sort of my part time right now.
Mark Warman 33:39
So where can people find you if they want to follow along with your journey?
Conor O'Donnell 33:42
So Instagrams the main one that I've been pushing for well since pandemic started really that that's that was my output from my stressful days I just all I do is jump on the bike, clear my head start taking some photos and lo and behold, the British nose buckle was born so Instagrams the main one the British nose biker, as I mentioned, YouTube is something I'm trying to move into which good is the British most biker, very original. And then I've got my website and that's where I'm also trying to bring other platforms in other bits of it I'm hoping to launch a store by living sorry now so who knows if you ever want to go to Newlands corner actually meet face to face I'm always up for actually riding meet with people and actually be able to put a face to a name there are people on Instagram who've known for since beginning pandemic I've only just met up with in person and it was so nice to actually be able to speak to these people in poor person actually see the bike for real that I've been admiring for years on end so that's helping people to meet up and actually go for a ride about his do that as well.
Mark Warman 34:40
Yeah, I mean I'll definitely be taking you up on that but listen, kinda it's been it's been an absolute pleasure talking to you and, and getting an idea of everything that you've been through, and I'm genuinely I'm so excited to see where you go in the future. And I look forward to catching up again for sure.
Conor O'Donnell 34:54
It means a lot. Thank you so much.
Mark Warman 34:58
So that was Connor O'Donnell at was known as The British Motorbiker. And it's clear that he's dealt with and continues to deal with adversity, but it's also really obvious how positive he is, and how building a personal brand has started to open up a really interesting future for him. For me, a huge part of Barnfield is about creating a community and connecting people. So do reach out to Connor and if you have a similar story, or if you've been inspired by his just let him know. You know, creating content can feel a lot like a one way conversation. So it's always a pleasure to hear from people. And in the meantime, if there's anyone you think I should be speaking to, just please do let me know. You can reach me on Instagram at Barnfield Customs or drop me a line on market Barnfield Customs calm and so look, take care and I look forward to catching on the next one.
