UK marathon runner Steve Way went from 102kgs to Commonwealth Games selection

STEVE Way used to weigh 102kg, binge on junk food and smoke 20 a day. Now he’s run far enough to cover the globe and has been selected for the Commonwealth Games.

British runner Steve Way has run enough miles to cover the entire circumference of the earth.

A BRITISH man who weighed 102kg, used to smoke 20 cigarettes a day and binge on junk food, has now run far enough to cover the circumference of the Earth.

And now he’s been selected to represent England in the marathon event at this year’s Commonwealth Games.

Steve Way, 39, decided to become a “healthier, thinner version” of himself in September 2007, after years of living on beer and takeaway.

He took up running and has since recorded every single step he has taken.

“The first thing I picked up after stubbing out that last Marlboro Red was my trusty Garmin,” [a fitness device that records your running data], Mr Way told The Mirror.

Steve before he started running.

“It turned out I’ve good genes for running,” he said. “I even took an office job that paid half the salary I earned so I could fit my training in.”

In the six and a half years since Mr Way started running, he has crossed 41,794 kilometres, enough to cover the circumference of the Earth (approximately 40,000 kilometres).

He came 15th in the London Marathon and this month set the British record for running 100km in 6 hours, 19 minutes and 19 seconds.

Mr Way is running 209 kilometres a week to prepare for the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow, Scotland. The Games start on July 23.

“When I started my running ‘career’ back in 2007, my only aim was to get fitter and thinner and feel better about myself,” Mr Way wrote on his blog, The Ultra Runner.

Steve during a marathon.

“As the years went on my goals have changed somewhat, as I strived to be as competitive in races as I could be.

“But my underlying motivation has always been just to get as close to my potential as I possibly can.

“The concept of representing my country in a major Games has only really been a pipedream so for it to happen now ... makes it all the sweeter!”

Mr Way is grateful for his wife’s patience over the years and says he is the luckiest man alive.

“The most remarkable part of this whole story — through all those seven years averaging 11 miles a day, through thick and thin, injury and obsession, ‘me time’ and ‘grumpy time’, [my wife] Sarah hasn’t sent me packing!! And for that I’m the luckiest man there is.”

“It is a fairy-tale scenario,” he said.

Follow Steve’s journey on his blog, The Ultra Runner.