Every April, the London Marathon attracts runners from around the world to Great Britain.

Not as many people know about the Mini London Marathon, a race which gives talented youngsters the chance to run the last three miles of the famous course.

The event isn’t a leisurely fun run. In 1999 and 2000, the event was won by a certain Sir Mo Farah.

Scroll down the roll call of winners a little further and there, in 2014, is the name of former British featherweight champion Zak Miller.

“It's called the British Road Race. You get picked from your county and you basically just go bang for three miles down past Buckingham Palace and stuff, it's good,” Miller (16-1, 3 KOs) told The Ring.

Miller was a boxer before he began taking running seriously but, for a time, he could have been forgiven for choosing athletics as his profession.

“I was the fastest non-African in the world over the 3000 metres at one point,” the former Great Britain team member said. “I think it was 8 min 13 secs or 8 min 14 secs at the time.”

It is 11 years since Miller set that time.

Although he is still more than capable of putting in a record-breaking turn on one of the notorious six-mile hill runs Manchester-based fighters regularly force themselves through, Miller’s running spikes are stashed away and he is solely dedicated to boxing.

The 28-year-old Mancunian and his trainer, Steve Maylett, have spent thousands of hours working to perfect his game.

In November 2023, Miller was hand picked to challenge Scotland’s excellent Nathaniel Collins for the British and Commonwealth featherweight titles. Although he performed well, he lost a majority decision.

Miller went away, beat Lewis Frimpong to win the English belt and got himself back into position. In February, he snatched his second chance with both hands by outpointing the previously undefeated and highly rated Masood Abdulah to become British and Commonwealth champion.

The fighter who outboxed and outfought the strong, relentless Abdulah bore little resemblance to the man who first walked through the doors of The Finest Gym more than six years ago.

Having seen Miller in action against two of their brightest hopes, Queensberry handed him a multi-fight deal and plans for his first first appearance under their banner were well under way when the British Boxing Board of Control named talented Welshman, Rhys Edwards, as his mandatory challenger.

Unwilling to change their plans, Miller and his team vacated the British belt to allow the Welshman to fight for it and the goal is for the two to continue along their own paths and meet when there is a bigger title at stake.

Miller remains the Commonwealth champion and will defend that title against Leicester’s Lyon Woodstock (16-4, 7 KOs) on Saturday night. DAZN will televise the action from Planet Ice in Altrincham.

“It's a business thing. I’ve won the British title, I was never going to stick around and defend it outright,” Miller said.

“You've got to move on. You’ve got to see how far you can go in the sport. In my eyes, some people want to stick around and they want to defend it three times and keep it but I just want to collect as many titles as I can. I believe the fight with Rhys Edwards is a cracking fight. I'd love that fight but it deserves to be for more than the British title, I think.

“I think Rhys would say the same. He’s a good lad, he's a good fighter — we both are — and hopefully we can get a fight in the future but for something big.”

Miller was in the away corner during his two previous appearances on Queensberry shows but he clearly made an impression.

Although he cut his teeth on the small hall circuit, Miller instantly took to life on the big stage. He was entertaining in and out of the ring and some influential people were impressed by the atmosphere and life his fans brought to fight week events.

He was invited back to be a guest commentator long before he put pen to paper on his promotional contract and strengthened Queensberry’s grip on a deep, talented featherweight division.

Most importantly of all, his performances against Collins and Abdullah proved that he is capable of competing and winning at the sharp end at 126 pounds.

Some fighters sign deals with major promoters and are happy to blend into the scenery and take whatever chances they are given. Miller believes that he has what it takes to become a standout.

“I think if you look back years ago, they were putting posters up in chip shops and pubs and stuff like that whereas now it's all social media based,” he said.

“I’ll be honest, I'm not too clever on the social media side myself but now I've got a bit more attention and the cameras are on me, I think you'll start to see the real Zak Miller and I think people will like it. I’m just being me, I'm just being myself and after the past couple of interviews, people seem to like it so I'll just carry on being me.

“I think you've got to be a full package these days in boxing. You’ve got to be able to fight, you've got to be able to talk and you've got to present yourself well.”

Woodstock is tough, aggressive and impossible to discourage. Although he came up short against quality operators Archie Sharp, Zelfa Barrett, Anthony Cacace and Kurt Walker, the 32-year-old from Leicester was a notorious finisher during his amateur days and has never been stopped.

The success Miller has enjoyed is a direct result of hard work and he has no intention of deviating from that that tried and tested method now. As well as his Commonwealth title belt, Miller knows that his future plans are also at stake this weekend.

“This is my hardest fight. This is the biggest fight of my career,” he said.

“I can't go from beating Masood Abdulah and then come into this thinking that was a bigger fight. No. This is a bigger fight if anything, Lyon Woodstock's a bigger name than Masood Abdulah. He’s a big name in boxing, he's been about and he's very experienced. Believe me, that's why I've trained the way I've trained.

“I'm just looking at this as Lyon Woodstock. It’s just another fight. I’m not bothered about cameras. It's great to be signed by Queensbury but it don't mean [expletive] now. This is a massive fight. I've got to go in there and I've got to do my job and by no means is it going to be an easy job but — if I listen to what Steve Maylett’s saying — I can make it an easy job.”