Blind AF is a new award-winning documentary that follows blind Paralympian, Army veteran and multiple world-record holder Shawn Cheshire on her extraordinary 3,600-mile solo bike ride across the United States. Directed by Ardsley resident and award-winning filmmaker Gina LeVay Goldstein, Blind AF captures Cheshire’s historic attempt to ride a single, non-tandem bicycle across America, 3,600 miles in 60 straight days, completely blind. Her journey serves as the backdrop for a much deeper story about trauma, healing, independence and the extraordinary resilience of the human spirit.
While working as a paramedic in 2009, Cheshire, a 36-year-old Army veteran and single mother of two, suffered a brain injury that left her without sight. Spiraling into a debilitating depression, she sought treatment at a VA hospital, where a combination of adaptive sports and treatment for Complex PTSD helped her begin rebuilding her life.
Within years, Cheshire was competing at the 2016 Paralympic Games in Rio. She went on to become a 13-time U.S. National Champion in paracycling and set a world record as the first blind person to cross the Grand Canyon without a sighted guide.
Drawing on her personal reflections as well as interviews with friends, doctors, trainers and family, the film reveals the experiences that shaped her and the painful memories she was finally forced to confront. LeVay combines intimate vérité filmmaking, breathtaking cinematography, journal entries and immersive sound design to bring audiences inside Cheshire’s experience of navigating the world without sight.
“From the beginning, Shawn and I worked together to create an authentic narrative true to her life and experiences,” said LeVay Goldstein. “This film goes beyond the epic athletic achievement; it’s a story about healing, transformation, and the power of vulnerability.”
For Cheshire, the cross-country journey became a defiant and life-affirming declaration of independence, a refusal to allow blindness, trauma, fear or other people’s expectations to define what her life could be. Executive produced by five-time Emmy winner Jeff ZImbalist (Harlan Coben’s “Final Twist”), the film had its world premiere at Geena Davis’s Bentonville Film Festival and went on to win Best of Fest at the 2025 Sedona International Film Festival. Blind AF is both an epic story of athletic achievement and an intimate portrait of a woman determined to live life on her own terms.
The film will be available for streaming on October 28th on Amazon Prime, AppleTV, Tubi, and Documentary+.
