In 2026′s Tokyo marathon, runner and teacher Annie Tran said the secret to her speedy finish was a disposable toothbrush.

“Every runner knows that mile 20 is where we have to dig deep and find what little energy we have left. After brushing my teeth, I felt revived and refreshed,” she said on Instagram.

That’s one way of getting past “the wall”. But whether you’re running a marathon or not, runner Katy Laser pointed out an issue dentists say could be common among distance joggers – and might even be mitigated by a post-run brush.

Despite not eating much sugar or drinking many fizzy beverages, Katy said in a viral TikTok that her dentist called her out on some issues, which she later attributed to gel packs.

“In addition to [gels] being little packs of sugar… that are very sticky… your mouth gets drier when you run,” she explained. “It is just sticking to your teeth in a ‘desert mouth’… running gels are essentially the perfect storm of cavities”.

Ultra-runner and dentist Arden Young agreed.

“The amount and frequency of carbohydrate that an endurance athlete ingests during competition and training can wreak havoc in your mouth, increasing risk of enamel erosion, dental cavities, and inflammatory periodontal disease,” she shared on Instagram.

She added that most sports drinks are acidic. And while saliva helps to wash away both sugar and acids, as Katy explained, this is diminished during a run. This may be exacerbated by heavy breathing.

One paper found “high levels of poor oral health” among London 2012 Olympians; 76% had gingivitis, and 55% had caries (tooth decay).

Young advised drinking water after taking running gels. Pond Square Dental added that staying hydrated is the “first and most important step” when you’re on a long run.

If your dentist thinks you need higher-fluoride toothpaste, they can prescribe them. Good basic oral hygiene and fluoride rinses can go a long way, too.

Reducing the number of sugary snacks and gels you consume may also help.

And if those don’t work for very long runs, Dr Douglas Elliott at Elliott Orthodontics said “brushing your teeth before and after workouts” is worth a try too.

Steven Spielberg has clarified his stance on AI in cinema after Emily Blunt′ recent comments about their new film, Disclosure Day.

In Spielberg’s new sci-fi blockbuster, Emily plays a local weatherwoman who begins speaking in an unusual, clicking alien language mid-broadcast, for reasons that become apparent over the course of the film.

During a recent interview with Entertainment Weekly, the British star opened up about the origins of these noises, claiming that Spielberg had told her: “You know, we could do it with AI, or you could do it.”

“I was like, ‘I feel confident I can make some weird noises’,” she then quipped.

Meanwhile, she also revealed to Hot Ones host Sean Evans that AI was something she was “a bit terrified of” when it was apparently presented to her as an option for her Disclosure Day character’s alien language.

Since then, Spielberg sat down with ITV News to discuss the film, during which Emily’s comments about him supposedly offering to create these sounds with generative AI were brought up.

“I would never have used AI,” he insisted. “I would have gone the old-fashioned way, you get a dolphin, an elephant, you slow it down, you speed it up, you play it backwards.”

He added that his Oscar-winning sound designer, Gary Rydstrom, would have found an organic way to make the sounds had Emily not been able to do them herself.

Spielberg has put his foot down on using generative AI during the filmmaking process in the past.

“I’m not willing to substitute, because I don’t really believe in sentience,” he said on the IMO podcast in March. “I don’t believe there is any substitute for the soul. I don’t think that is an algorithm that is inventible.”

He claimed: “Use AI as a tool, but do not use AI as the final word on anything creative. That’s where I draw the line.”

Explaining how she settled on the sounds that eventually made it into Disclosure Day, she told Entertainment Weekly that she had sent the iconic filmmaker voice notes of herself “clicking, humming, doing weird Barry White low singing mixed with clicking mixed with Morse code sounds”.

“I just tried everything,” she added. “We sort of threw the kitchen sink at it, and I think he wanted it to sound mathematical and not too terrifying.”

The Devil Wears Prada actor shared that the final version audiences hear in Disclosure Day is a mix of layered noises she recorded in a sound booth.

Emily also expanded on Hot Ones about how she and the sound team for Disclosure Day ultimately created the chilling sounds that get broadcast across America in the film without AI.

She explained that the sound engineer had one microphone by her mouth and another by her throat to “capture it in a really weird way”.

“And then the sound designer went away and created that weird sound,” she continued. “Even kind of leading up to that moment where she starts speaking in this non-human language, it’s a four-minute oner that we shot that leads up to that moment where she’s gradually sort of disintegrating.”

Disclosure Day is out now in cinemas.

Alan Cumming has thrown his support behind a new charity campaign inspired by his character in the Russell T Davies drama Tip Toe.

In the Channel 4 series, the Emmy winner plays Leo Struthers, who runs the fictitious queer venue Spit & Polish on Manchester’s iconic Canal Street.

Since the show began airing, the HIV charity The Terrence Higgins Trust has begun selling a t-shirt inspired by Spit & Polish, which Alan was seen wearing in a video posted on Instagram over the weekend.

“If you’ve watched Tip Toe, you’ll know that I play Leo Struthers, who has been living with HIV since 1994,” Alan told his followers.

“As he says in the show, back when Leo was diagnosed, it was a death sentence, but since then, thankfully, successful treatments have been found. Now, people like Leo just take one pill a day, which keeps their HIV in check and means they cannot pass HIV onto anyone else.”

He explained that, in Tip Toe, Spit & Polish is “a sanctuary where everyone feels safe, celebrated and free”.

“Now, you can buy your own Spit & Polish t-shirt to support people like Leo, living with HIV,” he continued. “Because, while treatments have improved beyond our wildest dreams, the stigma around HIV still remains, with too many people still met with judgement, ignorance and isolation. And we see that, of course, in Tip Toe.

“So please, please do something positive today, and order your Spit & Polish t-shirt from the Terrence Higgins Trust website. All the money raised is being split between HIV charities The Terrence Higgins Trust and the George House Trust.”

He added: “By wearing your t-shirt, you’re helping to build a lasting legacy for Tip Toe and making sure that no one faces HIV alone. Thank you and wear your Spit & Polish t-shirt with pride.”

Earlier this month, Russell explained that the depiction of Leo’s HIV status is a part of Tip Toe which he feels especially proud of, as it’s the “one thing” he “could never show” in his hit 2021 Channel 4 drama, It’s A Sin.

He explained: “[The story of It’s A Sin] ended in 1991, which is before the medications, before there was any treatment, before people started surviving properly.

“So [in Tip Toe], I’ve got the chance to show off a man living for 30+ years with HIV. He takes one pill a day, he’s completely fine, it’s undetectable, it’s untransmittable in him. And that’s a nice pay-off – that I never got to do [in It’s A Sin].”

He added separately that this “feels like the natural legacy of It’s A Sin”, claiming (via Scene magazine): “There wasn’t the time in that show to tell the long‑term story – that medications were found which saved so many lives – so this feels like a right and proper continuation.”

A similar t-shirt inspired by It’s A Sin previously raised £20,000 for the Terrence Higgins Trust in just 24 hours.

Sara Cox is pulling out all the stops to get her new Radio 2 show off to a flying start.

On Monday morning, Sara announced that her first Radio 2 breakfast show broadcast would be airing on Monday 6 July – as well as unveiling the A-lister of all A-listers as her inaugural guest.

For her first show, the presenter will be joined in the studio by two-time Oscar winner Tom Hanks, where he’ll be discussing the latest addition in the Toy Story franchise.

“Roll on the 6 July!” she enthused. “For generations to come people will (probably) say ‘where were YOU when the Sara Cox Breakfast Show was launched on Radio 2 featuring the legendary Tom Hanks?’ (and hopefully they’ll reply ‘listening and laughing along with a nice brew’).”

Back in April, it was announced that Sara would be taking over at the helm of the Radio 2 breakfast show, following the abrupt firing of its previous host Scott Mills.

At the time, Sara said she was “ecstatic, honoured and incredibly chuffed” to be taking on the role, which she said had been her “dream” since joining Radio 2.

“It feels like a bit of a full circle for me,” she admitted.

Sara previously hosted the Radio 1 breakfast show between 2000 and 2003, and had been Radio 2′s teatime host since 2019 before her latest appointment.

“I’ve had the most glorious seven years of my career on teatime so thank you to my brilliant teatime listeners who hopefully will join me at breakfast for excellent music and all my usual nonsense plus some superstar guests,” she added, noting that she “can’t wait to wake the nation up with the biggest most fun breakfast show ever”.

Since Scott Mills’ sudden exit, Gary Davies has been filling in on the Radio 2 breakfast show.

Harry Styles took a moment to share a powerful tribute to the late artist David Hockney on the first night of his 12-show Wembley residency.

Before Harry performed his single Aperture to a packed Wembley Stadium on Friday night, a quote from Hockney appeared on the screens.

“What an artist is trying to do for people is bring them closer to something, because of course art is about sharing,” read the quote, which was met with rapturous applause from the audience.

“You wouldn’t be an artist unless you wanted to share an experience, a thought.”

The pioneering British painter and photographer David Hockney died last week, at the age of 88.

Over the course of his career, he had become known as one of the most prolific and beloved artists of his generation.

In May 2022, the former One Direction star sat for Hockney, travelling to his Normandy studio to be painted by the legendary artist.

The resulting artwork was one of more than 30 new portraits displayed for the first time in the National Portrait Gallery’s exhibit David Hockney: Drawing From Life in 2023.

In the portrait, the Watermelon Sugar singer is depicted wearing an orange and red cardigan, with a pearl necklace and blue jeans.

Harry was a big fan of the Yorkshire-born artist, telling Vogue in 2023: “David Hockney has been reinventing the way we look at the world for decades. It was a complete privilege to be painted by him.”

David was less of a fan of Harry – in fact he had no idea who the Grammy winner was before he arrived for his portrait session.

“I wasn’t really aware of his celebrity then,” Hockney admitted. “He was just another person who came to the studio.”

Friday saw Harry open the first night of his record-breaking residency at Wembley Stadium.

The chart-topper will play the London stadium for 12 nights – breaking records previously held by Coldplay and Taylor Swift.

During the show, he also paid tribute to his X Factor days, recalling how his sister took him to Wembley Arena for his first audition.

“My sister is here tonight,” he said to the adoring crowd. “I want to thank her. I love you and I appreciate you.”

The animals of Ealing’s Paradise Fields have some unexpected new neighbours.

For the last couple of years, beavers have been making an enclosed 10-hectare site their watery home – and since more or less their 2023 arrival, a London Underground ticket office that used to be plagued by flooding has remained dry.

The city’s mayor, Sadiq Khan, has praised Ealing’s beavers for putting an end to soggy conditions in parts of nearby Greenford Tube station on Instagram.

“Beavers are nature’s engineers – we just didn’t realise how efficient they could be,” Khan said in his post, adding, “These incredible creatures have already stepped up to stop flooding at a Tube station and restore local habitats”.

We spoke to Elliot Newton, the director of rewilding at Citizen Zoo, which worked with the Ealing Beaver Project to reintroduce the animals, about why they were brought back to the West London site and how they might help us humans.

It’s not just London. In recent years, beavers have been released across the UK, including other parts of England like Somerset and Cornwall. Scotland has kept the wild beavers spotted as early as the 2000s, the Natural History Museum said, with planned releases in the Glen Affric Nature Reserve and River Beauty set for 2026.

Wales seems keen on bringing beavers back, too. Northern Ireland hasn’t expressed interest yet, but the animals were probably never native there, unlike the rest of the UK.

“The Eurasian beaver is a native British species that was hunted to extinction around 400 years ago (and likely disappeared from London much earlier),” Newton told us.

“Over the past two decades, there has been a growing movement to restore beavers across Great Britain.”

And while the expert argued there’s a strong case for bringing all kinds of native species back to boost our ecosystem – including those we might not love the idea of, like the rat-sized, fish-eating fen raft spider – “beavers also deliver significant practical benefits”.

He continued, “As ecosystem engineers, they create and maintain wetlands that can reduce flood risk, improve water quality, increase drought resilience, and support a huge range of wildlife”.

Newton said that flood mitigation was one of the main reasons they secured funding for this project.

That’s because beavers (famously) build dams which stop the rapid flow of water down rivers during, e.g., periods of extreme rainfall. They also form ponds and mini “canals” that can create absorbent wetlands.

“Through building dams and creating wetland habitat, the beavers have increased the site’s capacity to store water and slow flows during heavy rainfall events, helping reduce downstream flood pressure. Interestingly, since the beavers arrived, the local train station ticket hall, which had previously experienced flooding, has not flooded,” Newton said.

“While more research is needed, this is an encouraging example of the potential for nature-based solutions to support climate resilience in urban areas.”

Other benefits people involved in the Ealing Beaver Project have noted include increased biodiversity, better community engagement (leading to a reduction in antisocial behaviour), and a more climate-change-resistant environment.