David Aguirre and Samantha Robinson are both 56, they’ve been a couple for 20 years and they’re about to run their first London Marathon.

It’s been a dream of theirs ever since they discovered the running bug some seven or eight years ago, and it’s fair to say that they are counting down the days until the big race on Sunday 23rd April.

It was actually Sam who got the running bug first, taking up the sport when she was 49.

She joined Tewkesbury Running Club and liked it so much that David took up the sport soon after.

“It was either that or sit at home on my own,” he laughed.

So who was it that persuaded Sam to take up running?

“My friend Sheena Moseley,” she said. “She decided she wanted to go running. I said ‘no’ to start with but then I went along to the club, did the Couch to 5K, and it’s all gone on from there.”

It certainly has, with David targeting a time of four hours, 30 minutes in London “or a bit before” and Sam hoping to finish in just under five hours.

This will be David’s third marathon and his best time was in Newport, completing the 26.2 miles in four hours, 50, a time that would have been lower had he not cramped up.

Sam, meanwhile, is a veteran of six marathons and recorded her best time in her first race over the distance.

“It was in Edinburgh, I ran five hours, 17 seconds,” she said. “If I can knock 17 seconds off that time in London I’ll be very happy. But as long as I finish I’ll be happy.”

One of the motivations for Sam taking up the sport was that she wanted to run the London Marathon before she was 50.

She was unable to get a place in the race back in 2016 so ran in Edinburgh instead,  and like so many before her has had to bide her time before getting a chance to run the iconic event.

“It’s everyone’s dream to run the London,” said Sam. “I’m from London so it will be quite emotional for me, I will be nervous. It’s the ultimate marathon.”

David agreed that the London is number one, although he admitted: “I hate marathons, they take so much out of you. It’s not just the race, it’s all the training.

“Once we’ve run the London, that’s it, no more marathons, we’ll have achieved what we want to do.”

And if that sounds very final, it may not be because David adds with a laugh: “Mind you, Sam did say what if we could run New York…!”

Sam has received a charity place at this year’s London Marathon – she’s raising money for Whizz-Kidz, the UK's leading charity for young wheelchair users – while David has received a club place.

David is still going to raise money for charity, though.

“I’m running for SARA,” he said. “It’s the club’s charity this year.”

SARA is a volunteer lifeboat and inland search and rescue charity, a charity that has been saving lives on and around the Severn for almost 50 years.

Any support they receive is gratefully appreciated, of course, but it’s fair to say that when David and Sam got together a couple of decades ago, the idea of David raising money for the charity through running was fanciful.

“I never used to do any sport,” he admitted. “The only race I did at school was the 100 metres and that was because it was over the quickest! And I hated cross-country.”

Fast-forward many years and he has a completely different take on the sport.

“Running gives you such a high,” he said. “The first mile is always tough but once you get over three miles you get into a rhythm.”

Whether this year’s London Marathon is going to be their last over the distance is something of a moot point, but one thing is absolutely certain, they are going to carry on running.

“There’s a group of us from the club who go around Europe running half-marathons,” said David. “It’s really good fun. “We’ve run in Barcelona, Belfast, Berlin and Budapest.”

They’ve now signed up for the SuperHalfs, which is described as “an extraordinary running series for ordinary runners”.

The series consists of five half-marathons all over Europe, the first of which was in Lisbon in March.

“The others are in Copenhagen, Cardiff, Prague and Valencia,” said Sam, who has a best time over 13.1 miles of two hours, 13. David’s best time is one hour, 45.

David and Sam, who live in Tewkesbury, will be joined by four other runners from Tewkesbury Running Club in the London Marathon – the aforementioned Sheena Moseley, Ian Smith, Nick Matthews and Emma Ash.