Ryan Hearn is hoping to set a personal best when he takes part in Sunday’s Gloucester Half Marathon.

The Gloucester Athletic Club runner has a best time of one hour, 30 minutes, 52 seconds for 13.1 miles, a time that he set in Murcia in Spain last month.

“I’d like to break 90 minutes,” he said. “I think I will.”

The 28-year-old started running when he was a pupil at Longlevens Junior School and he was soon invited to Gloucester AC, but he has only just got back into the sport after taking a break for more than 10 years.

“When I originally joined Gloucester I was doing cross-country and running on the track – 800 and 1,500 metres – but I didn’t do any road racing,” he said.

“I ran for the school and I ran for the county a few times.”

He left Gloucester AC when he was 16 – “I was quite injury-prone so there was a lot of frustration,” he said – but although he was no longer a member of the club, he didn’t give up running entirely.

“I would run periodically,” he said. “I did the Gloucester 10K last year, I ran 47-something but I’d been ill the previous week.”

But he was clearly getting the taste for the sport again and much of that was down to Mike Hall, the landlord of the Pelican pub in the heart of the city.

“Mike started running in the pandemic,” said Hearn, who rejoined Gloucester AC in July. “He started doing parkruns and he was doing them in 21 minutes, which was something I wasn’t able to do at the time.”

Hall is also a member of Gloucester AC - he’s running the 10K on Sunday – and Hearn said: “He’s set up a parkrun team which is called the Pelican Pub Runners, I’m a proud member even though I do only about one a month.

“Mike is a true champion of the people, he entices as many people at the pub as possible to give parkrun, and running as a hobby, a go.”

Ask Hearn what his favourite distance is and he says with a laugh: “God knows, none of them,” before adding, “I enjoy running slowly, I can run relatively quickly but it’s not fun!”

He says that 5K is probably his favourite distance and while he may say he enjoys running slowly he’s certainly made an impression at Gloucester AC since returning to the club with press officer Chris Nield saying: “Ryan's come back into running and he’s producing some great times.”

And Gloucester-born Hearn, who lives in Tredworth, is enjoying being part of the club.

“It’s good to be back,”  he said. “It’s good being in a routine, it’s good for my fitness, my health and my mind.”

The Gloucester Half Marathon starts in Gloucester Park at 9am.