A MACMERRY man has run the London Marathon to raise thousands of pounds to help take a group of students to Cambodia this summer.

Ryan Strachan described the event as “pretty much hell” but his participation has raised more than £2,300 in sponsorship – a figure that will be doubled by Edinburgh’s Napier University.

The twenty-five-year-old will lead a group of 23 Napier students to Cambodia in July, where they will be teaching English and helping at schools and orphanages, and signed up to the marathon to help pay for the students’ trip.

They each have to raise £2,500 for the charity FutureSense Foundation to secure their place – with kind-hearted Ryan sharing his fundraising pot between them.

He said: “I was in some pain but I finished the marathon.

“I did the first half at personal best pace but I think I went off too quickly and got caught up with the crowd.

“I got to mile 15 and my legs gave up on me and I had to power walk a bit. In the end, I did it in over five hours, which I am a wee bit disappointed in.” Ryan, who is vice-president of representatives and volunteers at Napier Students Association, will spend three weeks carrying out volunteer operations with the students in the Asian country.

Despite his marathon pain, Ryan told the Courier it was something he had enjoyed.

He said: “To be honest, I’ve never experienced anything like it. It is a lot of work but from the start to the finish there are just crowds along the road.

“There is not one part of the course where they are not there.

“They just get you fired up so much and I have never seen anything like it in terms of a community getting behind something.

“It was actually quite a comedown on the Monday morning because it is all done with.” Ryan, of Annfield Court, admitted he was struggling towards the end but the camaraderie of other competitors spurred him on.

He said: “You always got folk patting you on the back if they saw you were struggling.

“It gets to the point where you did not register anybody because you were so tired.

“Everybody was so encouraging. I wanted to finish strongly and I was grunting because it was so painful, but this boy at the end came behind me and said ‘right, let’s do this’ and pulled me along for the final 50 metres.” To make a donation, go to uk.virginmoneygiving.com/rslondonmarathon