After failing his previous two challenges, reporter DAN KEEL bravely tackled the Greenwich half-marathon with just three weeks of training instead of the recommended four months.

EXERCISE has never really been my thing. I hate running and feeling out-of-breath, I detest gyms, and despise being outside in the wind and rain.

And so when Greenwich Council invited me to take part in the Run to the Beat half-marathon in October, I deleted the email.

Unfortunately the same message had been sent to my editor. There was no escape.

One of my fitness freak friends is constantly talking to me about "a runner's high." But he has to go 26 miles to achieve it! That's why I usually just drink instead - I get the same feeling from a flight of stairs (boom-boom).

Aware of my poor attitude to exercise, a gym-bunnie colleague of mine drew up a stringent training regime to give me a fighting chance of completing the course.

The schedule involved three hours of hill training every week, four hours of flat surface running and 'fartleck' (running slow then fast, then slow then fast).

I decided to do most of my running in the morning - before my brain could figure out what I was doing.

Another advantage to this strategy was that I avoided the gangs of youths who at night-time seemed intent on making my already dour evening even more miserable.

Some little gits remarked on my prune-like running face, others threw conkers in my direction, and the greatest comedians of all simply walked alongside me - proving how slow I was moving.

I can honestly say the training element of my race was the most unrewarding unfulfilling experience I have endured for a very long time. And it really started to wear me down - literally.

My t-shirt began to give me nipple rash and my toenail to toe ratio was very close to falling below one. But what makes it worse is that this was all for a sport which will never, ever be glamorous.

But just when I thought my pain could not get any worse - disaster struck.

I have a varnished wooden floor in my bedroom and when I am feeling slightly tipsy or hyperactive I enjoy nothing more than sliding across it in my socks while practising (badly) on my guitar.

Unfortunately three nights before the race, when I was celebrating the end of my training regime, I mis-timed a slide and stubbed my toe on the bed.

At first I thought it was broken, but after an hour decided it was just badly bruised and that I would plough ahead with the race.

After a lot of ice-treatment my toe recovered in time for what turned out to be one of the windiest, wettest days of the year.

Excluding a 30-second toilet break in the woods where a group of kids spotted me and shouted: "Look - there's that idiot from the paper", I completed the course without stopping.

Dan was raising money for the sporting bursary charity, Greenwich Starting Blocks.

To make a donation please make a cheque payable to Greenwich Starting Blocks and send to Greenwich Starting Blocks, 31 Thomas Street, Woolwich, London, SE18 6HU. You can watch Dan in action soon at newsshopper.co.uk/news/dandares