Thank-you for sharing our thoughts and experiences with us Martin...

1. How did you get into running?
To be honest I've been doing it for so long now that I'm not really sure. When I worked in London in my early 20s I used to swim every day (no, I can't really remember how I got into swimming either) but when I moved to Oxfordshire for a new job there weren't as many swimming pools so I decided to run on the country roads. So I went to a shop and bought a vest, shorts, pair of socks, and shoes. Since that time I have bought more, to the extent that I now have three drawers full!!! The first week I ran half a mile a day, the second week I ran a mile a day, and so on. It wasn't long before I was hooked on adrenalin and endorphins and have been ever since.

2. What made you move towards the longer distance events?
A greater sense of achievement. I ran the Winchester marathon twice, then the Abingdon marathon and planned to do one every year but life got in the way. But I ran to relax. Had a bad day at work? Go for a run to relax. Had a good day at work? Go for a run to celebrate. Had a boring day at work? Go for a run to burn off some energy. Had a tiring day at work? Go for a run to get the juices flowing. A 10k dash never seemed to have the same attraction as the longer stuff.

3. Do you do other sports?
Orienteering, mountain marathons (LAMM, Saunders), climbing. Every winter I go to Norway for a week of hut-to-hut mountain touring, a real break from working in London.

4. What is the hardest run or challenge you have undertaken so far and what made it hard?
High Peak Marathon - a brilliant experience, thoroughly recommended. At night, in winter, across the Peak District. We failed about a third of the way round in 2005 and in 2006 we were one of the 70 teams who didn't get a place but just two weeks before the event another team pulled out and we took the spare place at the last minute. And 42 miles - it was relentless. The best part was the teamwork needed to get round. The others were brilliant. I couldn't have done it without them. And the students who run it are so cheerful. It was worth the 42 miles just to have a bowl of their stew at the end. It took several days for my resting heart rate to return to normal.

5. Aspirations - tell us a bit about what you hope to achieve
Just to keep on going. One of my mates is 74 and this year he ran the London and Paris marathons with only two weeks between them. I'm only 52. I hope I die before I get old.

6. Aspirations for the series
I just want to take part in some good experiences. And if I'm not the last man home, then that is the icing on the cake. But I think next year might have to be the year when the series takes priority - I have so many events at weekends until the end of September that I have to make some hard decisions about which ones to do. I didn't register for the series until too late really.

7. Tell us a bit about your favourite run or race -where, how far what season, why its so good etc
Undoubtedly it's the LAMM. The intensity of emotion is so great that when I arrived home after last year's I felt like a soldier returning from a war. The pressure is immense. And I'm not even anywhere near the leaders - in fact last year we didn't even finish the second day. It has distance, landscape, remoteness, self-sufficiency, weather, excitement, pain, exhaustion, relief, camaraderie, everything. And my second favourite is the Beachy Head Marathon - I miss the KIMM to do that because they are on the same weekend.

8. Favourite race food
Used to be flapjacks but I find my mouth is too dry to eat them so I was just carrying them round and throwing them away at the end. Now it's a mixture of packets from supermarkets - I buy chocolate-covered peanuts, mixed nuts, exotic fruits, jelly babies, chocolate cooking lumps, and mix them all up in a very big see-through plastic bag and stick it in an outside net of the rucksack. Using a big bag means it's easy to get your hand in to grab some, and you can always just chuck some in a pocket for later.

9 When not running and racing I really love to...?
Go rock climbing with mates then drink beer. I used to go on expeditions every couple of years and helped organise two to Greenland, one to the far south and one to the far north recently but want to concentrate on longer-distance running now. I don't think those big trips are really worth the effort balanced against the likelihood of success. I once spent a year training for an expedition to Nepal and when I got there I had a bad night on the mountain and had to turn back long before the summit. And I spent a year getting ready for a trip to far north-west Greenland but when we got there the weather was bad so we couldn't do what we had hoped to do.

10. Living in the SE and working in London - how do you get your training done??
An excellent question and one that has been a bone of contention for years. I try three times a week to do my seven-mile circuit on London tarmac (round Buckingham Palace and never even had a wave of greeting, let alone been invited in for a cup of tea) at lunchtimes. Sometimes I substitute a short bit of speedwork - sprinting or fartlek. But tarmac running does your knees no good at all. So I try to get a two hour cross-country session at weekends. I had a cunning plan to move to the Lake District but when I persuaded my wife to come with me on holiday there to see what it was like it rained from Saturday to Wednesday evening and she said she'd never go again. I have to make do with trips to lumpy places and go for a run when I am there. Orienteering is good training. I like the challenge of navigation.

11. Worst moment - could be embarrassing, painful, whatever. Just something that has happened to you when running and racing that you would rather forget
Pulling out of the LAMM last year was a very bad feeling. But not as bad as going into a bog up to my waist on the LAMM last year. The first time was bad. The second and third times were not so bad and after that it seemed almost routine. But it was a shock at first.

12. Soapbox - what would you change about the series, the scene or the running world in general if you could
I don't think I'd change much, really. I certainly don't subscribe to the "grumpy old man" attitude that rants and raves against things. I've been pretty lucky to get this far really and I enjoy my running. I find I'm always looking forward to my next run, wherever and whenever it is.