Borders marathon man Richard Raw hoping to hit century down under

Jedburgh marathon man Richard Raw in Leeds this yearJedburgh marathon man Richard Raw in Leeds this year
Jedburgh marathon man Richard Raw in Leeds this year
Jedburgh marathon man Richard Raw is hoping to hit a century in Australia next month.

The 49-year-old has completed 99 of the 26-mile runs over almost three decades, 11 of them this year so far, the most recent being in Edinburgh in July, and he’s planning to make it into treble figures at the Melbourne Marathon on Sunday, October 13, during a two-week-plus trip down under.

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“I’m really looking forward to doing my 100th marathon,” said Raw, a worker at the Old Post Office in St Boswells.

“I’ve never been to Australia before, so it’s going to be good.

Jedburgh marathon man Richard Raw in action in Leeds this yearJedburgh marathon man Richard Raw in action in Leeds this year
Jedburgh marathon man Richard Raw in action in Leeds this year

“I’ve got Australian relatives, so I’m excited about meeting them. That’s why I chose Melbourne, because it combines two dreams of mine.”

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Raw aims to complete marathons in around five hours nowadays, saying: “I’m quite slow these days. I used to be quicker but I’ve been doing them a long time now, going on for 30 years.”

His first one – following on from his inaugural half-marathon in Selkirk three years prior – was in Sheffield in 1996, clocking what remains a personal best time of 3:38:24.

Hitting the 100 mark is a long-held ambition for Raw, a member of the North East Marathon Club south of the border and Gala Harriers, and he’s excited about being on the brink of that milestone, saying: “My dad used to do running and I always wanted to run with him, and once I got into running, marathons were the ones I aimed for, and once I started, as a teenager, I wanted to do 100.

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“That seemed almost impossible to do back then, but over the years, I’ve just kept plugging away and now I’ve got up to 99, I wouldn’t say it’s inevitable but it looks like it’s going to happen.

“Most of my marathons have been in the UK but I have also run them in Canada, Iceland, Ireland, Poland, Finland, Italy, the Netherlands and Malta.”

His Australian outing, a fundraiser for Brain Tumour Research, will be his last marathon of 2024 but he’s planning to carry on going the distance in 2025.

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“I won’t do any more this year after that but I will next year,” he said.

“Instead of doing lots of marathons a year, though, I think I’ll be more picky about which ones I do.

“I’ve been doing mostly full marathons, but now I’m getting to 100, I’ll start doing some shorter distances as well.

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“I’d always been trying to do marathon after marathon just to get to 100, but now I can kind of relax a little bit and maybe do just two or three marathons.”

Among the runs he’s got in his sights for next year are May’s Leeds Marathon and October’s Yorkshire Marathon at York.

The 99 marathons he’s run to date have included ones at Kelso in 2015 and 2016, Hexham in 2015 and Kielder in 2014, besides Sheffield back at the beginning and Edinburgh, North Yorkshire, Sunderland, Leeds, Gateshead, Blackpool and Durham this year.

To help Raw hit his £1,000 fundraising target next month, go to https://www.justgiving.com/page/richard-raw-100th-marathon

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