AS a former landlady, Horwich Harriers' England international Audrey Foster could be forgiven for pulling herself a pint as she celebrates 20 years of running.

Indeed that would be a rather fitting way to signal the beginning of her third decade of athletic competition, as it was in her then public house that the 51-year-old first became interested in the sport.

Some develop a thirst for running from a school sports day, others get a taste from watching an Olympic final while recently some may have been lucky enough to witness first hand the track and field at the Commonwealth Games.

But Audrey's introduction was back in May, 1983, as she watched the telly during a game of arrows.

The rest, as they say, is history.

The mother of two recalled: "I first became interested while I was a landlady at The Olde Oak pub in Lostock. I was practising for a darts match with my team and the London Marathon was on the screen.

"I thought 'I'd like to have a go at that' so the next day I bought a pair of trainers, entered the Bolton Marathon and went out for a run.

"I soon had a stitch so I stopped and walked and then ran a bit more and kept going for about 30 minutes. I did this every day and then two weeks later I entered my first race, a seven-mile multi terrain race.

"I came seventh and from that day on I was hooked.

"I continued to run every day and once a week with the Burden Lifeline group, who were trying to raise enough money to save Bolton Wanderers.

"Ten weeks after beginning I lined up for the start of the Bolton Marathon and finished in four hours 34 minutes."

Shortly afterwards, Audrey joined Horwich Harriers where she was introduced to different types of training and racing, including cross country, which became her favourite surface.

She stayed with the club for six seasons before moving to Bolton Harriers, where she spent nine successful years picking up a variety of individual and team national titles, including open cross country, vets cross country and vets road relays.

Her biggest achievements came in the mid-1990s, as she remembered: "I have a few memorable moments, first was being selected to run as an England reserve for cross country in Scotland in 1996.

"I also enjoyed winning a silver medal over 3,000m at the European Vets indoors in Birmingham in 1997, and it was fabulous being selected to run for Great Britain in France over 5,000m in an international match in 1998."

In 1999 she rejoined Horwich and has felt the quality among the ladies squad at the club has helped prolong her career and keep on improving.

That pressure helped the health support worker return to the international fold and achieve more success last November.

She said: "The Horwich ladies are thriving and very successful wherever they compete, especially in the local cross country leagues where they regularly win the titles. This strong competition for places has benefited my running enormously and I was delighted to receive another call-up to the England team in Northern Ireland where I helped gain the gold team medals in my age group."

So 20 years on, Audrey retains her love of athletics and wants to keep on running for as long as possible, despite the tough regime of training and gym work six days a week.

She said: "I love running and competing and I am as enthusiastic today as when I started all those years ago. Hopefully, I will still be running 20 years from now."