A RUNNER preparing for the London marathon says his training times are going to pot because he cannot pass by litter without picking it up.

Richard Warren, of Royal Field Close, is well-known in the Hullavington area for pounding the streets, and he cannot resist sweeping them clean as he goes.

He is distressed by the amount of litter stopping him in his tracks, and is urging people to bin it to help him win it.

“I am never going to get a personal best until I get a clear route,” he said. “I have to stop every 50 yards to pick something up.”

Mr Warren runs the roads around Hullavington, Norton, Foxley and as far as Nettleton via Grittleton, and said he usually collects two carrier bags full of rubbish on a five mile route.

The 70-year-old said he first took up running in 2008 for his health, because he wanted to make sure he was around to take care of his wife Lynette, 55, who has multiple sclerosis (MS).

“My plan is to live longer than her so I can look after her,” he said. “Lynette has lived and laughed with MS for over 30 years.”

When he runs his first marathon on April 26 with daughter Louise Clarke, they will be raising funds for the MS Society and the Swindon MS Therapy Centre.

Mrs Warren said: “I just think he’s barmy. He gets up at 5.15am when I’m still asleep.”

Mr Warren, who admits he may have a litter obsession, said he prefers to go out running when it is still dark because that way he can’t see the rubbish so well.

He said it all started because he and his wife would “drive around the beautiful countryside and we’d see all this litter – McDonald’s wrappers, hubs caps off cars, energy drinks; they don’t give them enough energy to put them in the bin.”

Mr Warren is a special constable in Malmesbury and a member of Sherston Drama Group and was a torch bearer in Trowbridge for the 2012 Olympics.

He hopes he and his daughter can raise £4,000 for charity and was given an unexpected donation on Sunday while running through Norton.

“A Range Rover pulled up and the driver said, ‘You’ve been doing that for a while haven’t you’, and he handed me £20. I thought, ‘That’s magic’.”

He hopes to complete the marathon in six hours, but said his main aim was 'to finish it alive'.

Donations can be made at https://www.justgiving.com/louise-richard70/