Charity fundraiser to run marathon - in a Norwich supermarket

Mary HamiltonA Norfolk runner is hoping to complete a supermarket dash for charity as he trains for the London Marathon.Mary Hamilton

A Norfolk runner is hoping to complete a supermarket dash for charity as he trains for the London Marathon.

Simon McKinna will run just over 26 miles - a full marathon - on January 23on a treadmill in the foyer of the Tesco store on Blue Boar Lane, Sprowston, which he hopes will raise �500 to be split between the East Anglian Air Ambulance and Virgin Unite.

Mr McKinna, an ex-soldier from Aylsham, is also organising a rowing competition, with entrants paying �1.50 to submit their fastest time for rowing 1km. Prizes will go to the fastest time and a time picked at random.

'Everything is going well at the moment,' he said. 'I've raised just over �2,500 towards the �5,000 goal, completed over 500 training miles and still have a few plans up my sleeve to bring in the rest of the cash.'

In December he organised a 24-hour running event at the Black Boys pub in Aylsham, where teams of sponsored volunteers took it in turns to run in costume.

At Aylsham Christmas lights switch-on he ran a competition for people to guess how far he could run in 90 minutes - he ran 11.5 miles and raised more than �50 on the day.

He also tackled Norwich half marathon in November wearing a bright yellow foam helicopter suit, an experience which he will be repeating in Silverstone in March and at Bungay in April.

Mr McKinna works for Virgin Media and will be starting the London Marathon alongside Richard Branson in April.

To sponsor Mr McKinna or to track his progress and learn more about the challenges visit www.mckinna.co.uk.