I have many pairs of trainers. I’ve run many miles in them. I have a pair of spikes for cross country, some trail shoes and fell shoes for different terrains, a pair for the track that’s a little lighter and a pair I wear for everyday training and running marathons. The pair I wear for marathons are, in many ways, my favourite pair.

I don’t want this to be an encouragement to you to go out and buy these running shoes, in many ways I hope it will be the opposite.

I buy this same pair of running shoes again and again. I’ve run nine out of ten of my marathons in them, only choosing a more grippy shoe because of the off-road sections of Snowdonia marathon. That’s 235.8 miles of marathon running and a fair few more miles in training. I know that they work for me. I’m loyal and, although occasionally my head gets turned by something a little lighter or nippier every now and again, I keep coming back to my Brooks Adrenalins.

The first pair I had saw me from beginner runner nervously starting out on the treadmill at the gym, through my first 10k race and my first marathon. Two years after starting running I was lining up  for my first marathon in my second pair. They were pretty similar to the first but red and half a size bigger. I’d laughed when the guy that sold me my first pair told me I needed a size six. I bought size four shoes left to my own devises, so we agreed on a compromise with a size five. Another year, and a few bruised toenails, down the line when I bought my third pair I finally agreed to a size six.

I impulse bought a pair in America when I saw then on sale. Knowing they’d fit, I threw away the box at the shop and crammed them into my bag to fly home, and I crammed another pair in my backpack when I went travelling for four months. I laced them up to run in Australia, Cambodia and Vietnam, as well as a half-marathon in Thailand. They came home to the UK and ran a couple of marathons a month later and then they got retired too. I’ve had two new pairs since then, a yellow and blue pair I ran Manchester and Frankfurt marathons in and a pink and purple pair I wore for London and Dublin marathons.

When I look back at my pairs of Adrenaline, they all bring back memories. So it was difficult for me to give several pairs away to charity. But knowing that the women who would receive them from A Mile in Her Shoes would run more miles in them made this sentimental idiot feel better.

Last week Brooks kindly sent me a pair of the latest Brooks Adrenaline GTS15. I’ve paid for my previous six pairs so I’m viewing this as the equivalent of a free coffee after you get enough stamps on your card. I put them on and ran around Peterborough at the weekend showing them where my last pair took me at the end of the Iron Person. They’ve got a lot to live up to already – their predecessors have taken me on some amazing adventure.

If you like running in a pair of shoes and they work for you, stay with them and let them take you somewhere fun. That’s my advice.