Terminally ill man from Altrincham running 5k every day for a year to encourage others to get active

• Tony Collier tells Lucy Meacock about his challenge.

A terminally ill man from Altrincham is running 5k every day for a year to raise money to help other people get active.

Tony Collier was diagnosed with prostate cancer four and a half years ago after noticing a pain in his groin while training for an ultra marathon.

The diagnosis did not stop him from running, and now he has set himself the challenge of running 5k every day for a year.

Tony is raising money for charity MOVE, which uses physical activity and exercise to improve the lives of people with cancer.

MOVE encourages people to get involved with their '5k Your Way' parkrun, and Tony has become the charity's regional champion for the North West to help develop the initiative across the region.

Tony said: "I find challenges really motivating and I think it helps me enormously with my mental health."

Over the years Tony has completed 20 marathons and in 2017, he was training for one of the world's toughest ultra marathons.

But 2017 was also the year of his terminal cancer diagnosis.

He said: "I was training for an ultra marathon but was being hampered by a groin strain, so I went for a scan and I got a call the next day saying I had cancer.

"It spread into the pelvis, hips, rib, spine, neck and skull and I was given the worst case prognosis of two years and that's four and a half years ago.

"Being told you've got cancer is devastating, being told they can't cure it is indescribable and you go into the depths of despair. I spent 18 months feeling very sorry for myself but then I realised, you've got to live life to the full."

This year, Tony has watched his daughter get married, and he now has three grandchildren.

Tony hopes to get as many people as possible involved with '5k Your Way'. You can find more information here.