BBC Breakfast star Roger Johnson has been forced to pull out of a charity run for Children in Need after suffering an injury.
Johnson, 57, had signed up to run in this year’s BBC Children in Need appeal, which requires participants to run 26.2 miles over the space of two weeks.
“Lots of people do a marathon in one go so how hard could it be?” wrote the broadcaster in an article for the BBC. “Well, perhaps I shouldn’t have been so conceited.”
Johnson – who hosts BBC North West Tonight and BBC Breakfast at weekends – recalled that a long-standing foot problem flared up four weeks ago, which he treated accordingly by icing it, raising it, and seeing a doctor who gave him medication and an X-ray.
He persevered with the run, organising to run the first few miles with members of Lostock Athletics Club in Blackrod, Manchester, but was unable to begin. “I arrived, hobbling, and had to watch bemused as they jogged off into the distance without me,” wrote Johnson.
The TV presenter eventually was forced to call it quits on the challenge as a whole when, by the end of October, he was still only “hobbling”.
Happily, his team at BBC North West Tonight, banded together to run the miles on Johnson’s behalf, with more than 30 employees running 160 miles between them. “Far more than my target,” he said.
Still nursing his injury, Johnson noted: “If I’m asked again to do something for the cause next year, I will promise to be a little less complacent.”
Not my finest hour! But it shows the essence of what @BBCCiN Children in Need is all about: people coming together to help others. There’s a mildly amusing film about it on @BBCNWT on TV this evening at 1830. https://t.co/lhdOyvP7TT
The broadcaster shared the story to X, writing: “Not my finest hour! But it shows the essence of what @BBCCiN Children in Need is all about: people coming together to help others.”
His running journey will feature in a “mildly amusing film” on BBC North West at 6.30pm tonight 5 November.
Children in Need 2026 will be broadcast live on BBC iPlayer and BBC One at 7pm on Friday 13 November.
Beginning in 1980, BBC Children in Need raised money to support disadvantaged children and young people across England, Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland.
Joining the BBC after university, Johnson left BBC South in 2011 after 14 years to replace Gordon Burns as the main anchor on North West Tonight. He has been a regular reporter on the broadcaster Match of the Day and since 2012, a regular presence on BBC Breakfast on the weekends.
