Kamran Khan began running at the age of 15 and became Hong Kong 800 metres champion at 16.

Now 24, and set to race over 800m and 1,500m at next month’s National Games, things have not come so easy for Khan since his golden start.

There have been shattered dreams, a brief detention on the Chinese border, the day he hid in a toilet to avoid racing, and a six-year battle to obtain his Hong Kong passport.

Having emerged from all that as the city’s best middle distance runner, it is no wonder Khan is unapologetically ambitious.

“If you’re in this sport you should want to reach the pinnacle, to get to the Olympics and World Championships and compete against the best,” Khan said. “If that’s not your goal, you’re doing the wrong thing.”

Khan was born in Hong Kong to Pakistani parents. His dad came to the city for work in the 1970s and married in the early 1990s.