POOR old James Daly.

This is the story of the Bury councillor and wannabe MP who announced to the world that he was going to complete a charity bike ride from Bolton Town Hall to Downing Street.

Unfortunately for Cllr Daly — who is hoping to be elected for the Tory party in Bolton North East — he had to pull out of his challenge, three days in, after suffering a back injury.

I feel some sympathy with him. A few years back, I rather ambitiously announced that I would be entering Bolton's Ironman triathlon.

As the competition got closer, I slowly realised that despite my training for the London Marathon, I wasn't quite up to the job when it came to Ironman — a marathon plus a three-mile swim and a 100-mile bike ride.

I was saved by the fact that a new job took me away from Bolton. I sheepishly used that as my excuse and pulled out of the race.

I've always regretted it. Hopefully, one day I might be able to do Ironman — not this year though. I played five-a-side this week for the first time in six months.

I was gasping for after just 10 minutes. My colleagues thought I was suffering an asthma attack — sadly, I'm just painfully unfit.