I was most definitely not born to run,” says Melanie Sturman, 46, from Thetford in Norfolk. “I don’t find running easy, but hey, who does? I have a congenital knee disorder where my kneecap does not sit correctly so it rubs on the bone and, because it’s out of alignment, I don’t have a natural running gait. As a result, when I started running in 2011, it was difficult and I couldn’t even run a mile. Being overweight didn’t help, but I was determined to succeed so I taught myself to slowly jog for five minutes and walk for one minute. It took me three months to work up to walk/running 15 miles.
“The reason I took up running was because I’d been inspired by Paula Radcliffe when she broke the world marathon record. I thought back then that one day I’d like to have a go at running 26.2 miles and so, in 2011, I entered the London Marathon. My time of 6hrs 3mins wasn’t as quick as I’d hoped because, leading up to it, I’d had a fever but I enjoyed it so much that six months later I did the Liverpool Marathon and knocked 45 minutes off my time.