Mark Wright recruits Olympian Paula Radcliffe to help him through London Marathon

2022-09-30

Mark Wright has been training for the London Marathon with the help of Olympic gold medallist Paula Radcliffe, revealing the runner has been "incredible".

The former The Only Way is Essex star, 35, spoke of being mentored by the once-fastest female runner of all time, 48, in a chat with OK!: "You can't really beat it, can you? She’s incredible. When you're training for something like this, you always take advice on Google or people you know, who have done it everyone gives you different advice, but I just stuck with her expertise and advice."

He added: "And of course, it was the best. Because she's the best of all time."

Mark – who has finally moved into his epic Essex mansion – revealed he has been working with Paula for around two years after originally signing up to do the marathon last year.

But after suffering an injury, he had to pull out of the race. "I pulled out because of my injury. She was helping me through the recovery too," he shared. "I couldn’t have done it without her support.

"I mean, the first time I met Paula, was an honour, really. I wouldn't say I was nervous. It was a pleasure."

Speaking about how he will be celebrating after the race on Sunday, Mark told us: "I reckon there will be a few drinks with the family and stuff like that. A few beers, but I'm sure I'll be so tired. I probably won’t want to be celebrating for too long. I’ll probably pass out!"

Mark will be cheered on by wife Michelle Keegan, 35, as well as his family on the day, and the Essex star revealed having their support is "important" to him.

"Having them there will be really good for me, it should give me that extra push to keep going," says Mark.

As we spoke to Paula ahead of the marathon, she said Mark is a "brilliant" runner – revealing he has probably "surprised" himself with training for the day.

"I think he would say he probably didn't see himself as a marathon runner in the beginning," she revealed. "He was quicker with the shorter distances and I think coming from football as well, that kind of made that side easier. But he's probably surprised himself.

"I think he's handled the longer runs and the psychological side of it really well because that's hard. And he's handled it really well. And he's just kind of set up a programme and stuck to it."

She continued: "So yeah, just really hoping race day goes well for him. And he gets everything out of it, because he's put a lot of work into it."

Mark and Paula worked together with Flora by taking part in Flora’s Get Towns Active Runalong, which aimed to encourage communities across the UK and Ireland to take small steps towards a healthy, more active lifestyle.

Paula said: "I think it's been a real honour for me to be involved with flora in this campaign, it's a great way to kind of get people active, getting moving to a beautiful location here in Brighton.

"It's really just about trying to encourage people to pride themselves and to try and make those little changes to just get even more active than they already are."

For more information on how to join in the Get Towns Active movement, visit flora.com and follow along with Mark Wright, Paula Radcliffe and the rest of the FLORA community on social channels using #TeamFlora #GetTownsActive.

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