This year, Mr Keem will try and make it three years in a row.

"There's a little bit of pressure returning to do the race again because I think a lot of people have expectations for me," Mr Keem said.

"But that doesn't really worry me too much, I can only control my own race and if I get a good block of training in between now and April and am fit and healthy on the day I think I should be able to have another good crack at it."

Mr Keem, who has been a long-distance runner since he was eight years old, will be one of more than 6500 runners converging on Canberra in April to participate in either the 5km, 10km, half marathon, The Canberra Times marathon and the 50km ultra marathon as part of the Australian Running Festival.

"It was probably the sport I was best at when I was younger and I just stayed with it and still enjoy doing it 30 odd years later," he said.

"I had a coach throughout my teenage years and then once I was about 18 to 19 years old I just self-coached myself right through until now."

The courses will see runners follow the parliamentary triangle, along the banks of Lake Burley Griffin, and finishing outside Old Parliament House.

The festival begins on Saturday, April 14, with the 5km and 10km fun runs and the more serious courses. The half marathon, The Canberra Times marathon and the 50km ultra marathon will take place on the Sunday.

In preparation for the marathon, Mr Keem has upped his training from running every morning to twice a day.

"I normally run every morning, no matter if it's rain, hail and shine," he said.

"It's very rare that I'll miss a day and when I'm in full training I'm training twice a day, up to 200km a week. It gets reasonably full on."

Mr Keem said he always had a game plan with each race and it had been made easier with modern technology.

"I try to run fairly even so I don't try and go out too hard and then essentially blow up," he said.

"If I'm trying to run a three hour, 50km race I know that it's three minutes and 36 seconds per kilometre so I just try and run that or thereabouts for every single kilometre and then hope I don't get super tired and slow down."

There will be entertainment for runners and their fans, as well as event expo, elite athlete district, and a little runners' zone fitted out with kids' activities, making it a weekend for the whole family. The 2018 Commonwealth Games will be broadcasted live.

"I love the routine that running allows me to have, I get up every morning and run and that always starts my day off well," Mr Keem said.

"One of the other plus is that I get to travel for races so I've been very fortunate to have travelled to a large portion of the world, just through running events.

"There's lots of pluses when it comes to the running."

This year the Australian Running Festival prize pool totals almost $20,000.

Early bird entry ends on Tuesday, January 16.

For more information visit www.runningfestival.com.au

The Canberra Times