For some time now people living in Sholden and London Road in Deal have been intrigued by the sight of a teenager striding rapidly along on what looks like a hi-tech pair of stilts.

The teenager in question is 18-year-old Tom Williams who is a devotee of an exercise which is known variously as “bocking”, “powerbocking” or “Powerising”, and which involves running and jumping with elastic-like spring-loaded stilts.

They were invented five years ago by German Alexander Bock, hence the name “bocking”, but Tom, a student at Canterbury College, says: “I tend to call them Powerisers, which is the brand name of one of the types of stilts on the market.

“I bought mine about three years ago and they cost £300, but there are cheaper makes available.”

And the stilts enable Tom to run up to a speed of 20mph, which means he can get to Deal town centre from his home in The Street, Sholden, in about 12 minutes.

But achieving that sort of speed requires plenty of practice, and a fair number of cuts and bruises along the way, with Tom adding: “It took me between eight and 10 months to start running on them with confidence, and then maybe another 18 months to stop falling over every now and again. “

See this week’s East Kent Mercury for the full story,