Young Luca is a man of many talents. In case being an artist, chef and model wasn't enough, he's also making waves as an international athlete. He's not one to brag though, so we'll do it for him.

In a sentence, tell us about yourself

I don't really know how to describe myself in one sentence, I run a lot, a lot of my life at the moment falls around my running: training, recovery, strength work and food takes up a lot of time but I really enjoy the entire process. I'm a European U23 Championship Finalist and have a bronze medal from the World Universities Cross country Champs and have broken my body many times to get there. I also really enjoy food and travelling, I was working in kitchens for almost two years before working here.

What gets you up in the morning? What’s the first thing you do?

Generally the first thing I do in the morning is train. Usually before that i'll have a quick bagel, glass of water and a banana for breakfast no.1 then get out the door. I'll come home from my session or run and have breakfast no.2 which is generally either porridge or poached eggs and get myself ready for my day, be that working at Runlimited or whatever else I have on. If I'm not training in the morning then I'm probably not up in the morning and I'm rinsing the fact that I have a rest day.

What gets you out the door to run?

At the moment, I'm pretty motivated the get out and train, I'm coming back from a 'fun' 3-month long illness and also picked up an injury during that time. I'm really enjoying coming back to running and picking up my mileage and getting myself in the gym to hopefully stop the injury cycle I found myself in and make sure I'm as physically healthy as I can be.

What excites you about the running community in London?

The London running community is pretty cool, I get to interact with some many different types of runners every day from people looking at their first pair of running shoes; runners going for their 6th Marathon Major; to athletes hunting PBs on the track its such a diverse set of runners. Finding my place in that and having a group to train and compete with makes being in the sport so fun. Having other athletes holding you accountable just makes the long miles so much easier. At the end of the day, distance running is an individual sport so creating that community for yourself is special.

Favourite shoe of all time?

I don't know if I have a favourite shoe all time. I really like the Ascis Novablast 4 which is my training/ faster day shoe at the moment, probably not the first shoe that comes to mind for that but it helped me reach some pretty fast times so far so it definitely does what I need it to do. I like cushiony trainers that offer a softer ride, I've used the Saucony Ride, New Balance 1080 and Asics Gel-Kayano in the past and would definitely go back to those at some point.

Give us some London recs, what should we be checking out?

My favourite spot in L̶o̶n̶d̶o̶n̶ the world is Hackney Marshes – I do basically all my easy running and tempo sessions around there. It's kept me off the roads, its flat and I think it's the perfect place to train. Hackney has some amazing bakeries like E5, Dusty Knuckle and Uchi Bake which I definitely recommend trying. Hai Café is probably one of my favourite restaurants ever and I love showing people there, it's become super popular but defo worth the visit. Same as 3 Bowls and Mambow, all in Lower Clapton. Or just go to a market, we have so many scattered around London, they're so good and it's fun to explore each pop up. I've just back to London after 4 years, so I'm still exploring all the new food spots that have appeared since I've been gone but the food scene in London is amazing and you can't go wrong by just exploring and stumbling into a restaurant that speaks to you.

Anything else you want to add to the people out there?

The last bit I want to share is: book that race abroad! It's such a great opportunity and such a fun moment. These are some of my best running memories. Do it!