And I’ll tell you what: tick followed tock followed tick followed tock followed tick…. Apparently it takes 119.5 seconds to pour the perfect pint of Guinness.  Not that Kelvin would know this.  At marathon pace, he would cover 518 metres in this time.  And the carpet in the Rose and Crown is looking threadbare as it is.  He also prefers Staropramen, although he did enjoy the pint of London Pride ‘handed’ to him by a spectator after 21 miles of the 2008 Flora London Marathon. 

Kelvin started running in 1990 and still hasn’t stopped.  The 1972 Olympic Marathon Champion Frank Shorter once said “You’re not ready to run another marathon until you’ve forgotten the last one”.  Fortunately, Kelvin has a famously bad memory and has run a total of 23 marathon and ultra-marathon races. 

These have included large city marathons such as London (2.58 debut in 2006), Rotterdam (2.42 PB in 2010) and Berlin and smaller events such as the Abingdon and Isle of Man marathons.  And as the outright winner of three small marathons not mentioned in the previous sentence, former 48 hour Team Treadmill World Record Holder Mr Dickinson modestly notes “I don’t like to talk about them in case a proper runner turns up and kills the golden goose.”

In early 2006, a friend asked me to start running with them for fun. So I did. A year later, someone asked me to do a marathon for fun. So I did. Then I discovered that beer was the perfect recovery drink after endurance running and here I am, 14 marathons and 2 ultras later, still running and still drinking.

Now I'm facing the toughest challenge, 26 beers a day for 13 days, sorry, 26 MILES a day for 13 days. Sounds easier that way doesn't it?

Joined Ellesmere Port RC in June 2004 after ballooning from 11st 7lbs in 1997 to 16st 1lb in 2003. Best move I ever made.

Swore I'd never run more than 10k, by June 2005 I was running my first half marathon (Freckleton) in 1:46. Did my first marathon (Paris) in February 2006, had a disaster by my own expectations with 3:32:02. From that moment on, I was determined to break 3 hours...

I ran 2:55:55 in New York November 2006, ran 2:51:51 In Edinburgh May 2007, 2:58 in Amsterdam Oct 2008  unfit and 2:49:28 in Chester Marathon May 2010. I've also won a Cheshire Champs silver medal for 5 mile.

Do I like running? Not really.

Do I like the competitiveness? You bet and it's the one thing that gets me out the door of a winters evening. Standing on that start line when in good shape, is there anything better? Well, yeah, probably but for a sheer adrenaline rush, you can't whack it :-)

So, just joined my new club Wirral AC and joining up with my old nemesis Kelvin... for once fighting on the same team! I've been beaten by him so many times, think I'd prefer to be running with him :-)

So, here we are, 340 mile each in 13 days... lets hope this aging body can cope...

Now for a real challenge, 13 marathons in 13 days! Bring it on!