Eddie Izzard is in Edinburgh this evening but he won’t be joining in the Festival festivities.

The stand-up comedian is marking the halfway point in a charity marathon around the UK.

Izzard is running over 1,000 miles in seven weeks, equalling a marathon a day. On Thursday he tackled Arthur’s Seat.

He revealed to STV News that even the nerve-jangling demands of stand-up comedy were nothing compared to marathon-running.

He said: “Stand-up comedy is easy compared to this. I did a gig in the Lake District and that seemed like relaxing and then I had to go back to the running.”

The TV favourite had scant athletic experience but was inspired to run to raise cash for Sport Relief.

He explained: “I wasn’t really a runner and I liked my football. But in my teenage years everything went downhill.

“Sport Relief said: ‘Do you want to do something’ and I said: ‘Well, what about this?’ and I came up with the idea of running around the entire UK doing a marathon a day and one day off a week.

“They thought it was insane – and it sounded good.”

Izzard has many miles behind him already – but more ahead too.

He said: “I’ve now run 615 miles, the equivalent of running to Milan from London. I have run 26 marathons. Today I’m not running a marathon but I am running to the top of Arthur’s Seat. So just a fun day.

“Apparently what I’m doing is ultra-running – that’s what you do when you run more than a marathon.”

He has been keeping a video blog of his progress, which can be seen here.