“She’s lovely, she’s wacky and fun.”

So says Ann Beech about Helen Motteram, her friend and fellow Charlton Kings Running Club member who has built up quite a sizeable following running marathons around some of the great cities in Europe.

She’s already run in Paris, Amsterdam and Athens to name a few and she’s caught the eye of many because, along with her husband Tristan, she competes in fancy dress.

She’s run as a superhero in Paris and Amsterdam, Medusa in Athens and as a Roman in Rome.

No wonder she’s called “wacky and fun”, sentiments she entirely agrees with.

But while she’s having fun – “I want to run a marathon in every capital in Europe,” she says – there is also a more serious side to her running because she wants to draw attention to a cause that is very close to her heart.

Helen, who is 42, is a pet behaviourist and set up Russell’s Rescue back in 2016 at her home in Charlton Kings.

Russell’s Rescue is a voluntary, family-run corvid rescue, rehab and sanctuary and was established soon after Helen took a seriously injured crow into her home, nursing him and restoring him to good health.

She named the crow Russell and both she and Russell became household names when Hollywood legend Russell Crowe tweeted his support for Russell’s recovery with the words, ‘What a nice lady Helen is to look after the poor blighter.’

It turned out that Russell was actually a rook – “Rooks look like crows when they’re young,” explained Helen – but a few years later the Oscar winner, a renowned animal lover, donated £500 towards an operation that Russell needed on an eye, an operation that proved successful.

Russell and Helen were also special guests on the TV show This Morning when it’s fair to say Russell managed to ruffle the feathers of the usually sanguine Holly Willoughby.

Sadly, Russell died last year, but Helen’s work continues.

Russell’s Rescue can take in 30 birds – some live with Helen in her house – and she freely admits it’s a 24/7 job.

But when she does get a bit of time to herself, the one-time Balcarras School pupil isn’t putting her feet up. Quite the opposite because she’s out and about running for fun.

She’s also a member of Cheltenham-based Almost Athletes and has become a big fan of all things running.

“I started during Covid,” said Helen, who is Cheltenham born and bred. “I’d never run before, I’d always hated running but I was very low, I couldn’t go to the pub, I couldn’t do anything.

“I did the Couch to 5K, my husband trained me.”

Tristan is a former personal trainer – he’s a dog trainer these days – and Helen continued: “He was very good, pretty soon I wanted to do a half-marathon and after that I wanted to run a marathon.”

Her first half-marathon was in Cheltenham in 2021 when she completed the 13.1 miles in around two hours, 22 minutes.

The following year she improved that time by about 11 minutes, but she admitted: “I’m not a fast runner, I’m slow and steady.”

That may be true but three years ago she completed the Paris Marathon in five hours, 12 minutes – the first time she had run over 26.2 miles – and she’s also run in Warsaw and Prague.

“I want to run marathons in all the European capitals,” she said. “I want to run two a year over the next 20 years.”

Tristan will be by her side, of course.

“He’s faster than me but we run together, we’re a team,” she said.

This year they’re planning to tick off another couple of capitals by running in Oslo and Cardiff, and they should be easy to spot because they are having some flags made to further promote Russell’s Rescue.

“I want to become nationally known for my work with birds,” said Helen.