Waiting in the melee of people excited for the Paris marathon to begin, it strikes me what a curious thing both we and the thousands more who are out to support us are doing. Today is a day to celebrate the undertaking of a massive challenge for no reason beyond proving that such a thing can be done. It’s delightfully representative of humanity that such an event is supported and celebrated and taken on with such enthusiasm.

15 minutes pass between the race beginning and my reaching the start line. For the duration of this period, the Black Eyed Peas, on loop, inform me that tonight’s going to be a good night. Tonight, I think, is not on my mind right now.

I pass the start line and immediately find myself worrying that I’m either rushing or lollygagging. I’m used to running alone, and my pace naturally sets itself. Surrounded by 40,000 others, all going at different speeds, everything becomes relative and I find I have no idea whether I’m going faster or slower than normal. So I speed up.

Two miles in, barely begun, I overhear a Liverpudlian runner ask his friend, “How do you feel? ‘cos I don’t feel that good.” I feel amazing. I am running a marathon.

A man clutching a newspaper stands alone on an island in the middle of the road. As 40,000 eager athletes stream past him, I wonder if he will be stranded there for the next four hours.

As we reach the first series of tables where bottles of water are thrust by eager volunteers into the already desperate hands of passing runners, the sound of feet in motion is overcome by the clicketing of bottle tops tumbling across the tarmac. It sounds as if the runners have all spontaneously donned tap shoes. People swig from the miniscule bottles and throw them into the road - a period I come to refer to as “bottle gauntlet”. A spinwheeling bottle empties itself onto me as it careens overhead. “Thanks,” I say, to nobody in particular, uncertain whether I’m being sarcastic or not.

Five miles in, I spot ahead of me another runner in an Oxfam “Superhero” vest like my own. He is the only other obvious Oxfam supporter I will see during the marathon. I had been told earlier in the week that a colleague named Rob Flatt was also running, and assume this is he. I consider going to say hello, but the desire to finish as quickly as possible overtakes me, and I him. As I think about this, the line “I want to be the very best” infiltrates my head, and for the next few miles I am harassed by the few words that I know of the Pokémon theme tune.

Spurred on by the surrounding supportive calls of “allez!”, I make a mental note that, in time for the next marathon, I should ask those people who know me as Al to start referring to me as Ally. Of course, I quickly realise, the next marathon is in Berlin, so I will have to change my name to “Gehen”.

I dread reaching the next refreshments table and the next bottle gauntlet, as thirsty and hot runners empty the proffered water onto their tongues and faces and discard the half-empty bottles into the road. The thoughtful refreshed aim the bottles in an arc that lands off the side of the road. The less sensible opt to hurl them like greased bowling balls, and they skid across the tarmac in front of petrified runners who have to dance over the hurtling ammunition until they pass the danger zone.

As I go on, I spot runners whose t-shirts declare them members of “Team Bultex” and “Team GDF Suez”. I wonder if they are unlucky employees of the event’s sponsors, cruelly roped into being representatives on the run.

Up ahead, I see a woman standing on a podium in the middle of the road, screaming in French at the runners. I wonder if it is some sort of military initiative to encourage us. As I get closer I see that, at the foot of her podium, several photographers are crouched, snapping passing athletes, I suppose for the benefit of those who want to visibly document their state before, during and after the race. The woman’s wailing, I assume, is to warn runners not to tumble over these devious human boulders hunched in the road. I wonder if there are any photographs evidencing that the warnings failed.

We reach another refreshments table, fourteen miles in and several miles after I have realised how much I crave sustenance that isn’t water. I grab half an orange as I pass, and squeeze it into my mouth. It is unquestionably the most delicious thing I have ever tasted. Exuberantly thankful toward this heavenly fruit, I vow to eat an orange every day for the rest of my life. (The next day, I fail.)

Only a mile later, the juice of the delicious orange has turned painfully acidic in my stomach. My armpits, chafed by my Superhero vest, ache. (I later find out they are bleeding.) Suddenly I see before me a chimera: the other Superhero, Rob Flatt, is several yards ahead of me! How can this be? Did I not overtake him five miles in? Is he really a Superhero? I don’t know Rob Flatt; I know nothing about him - except that he is now my nemesis. He is no Superhero at all. I will defeat him at all costs.

I lose sight of Rob Flatt quickly as we enter a dark tunnel. We have already been under several bridges, and I expect to exit this underpass as swiftly as those previous. But we remain seemingly endlessly in the half-light of the yellow lamps that barely show us the way. I observe that the runner in front of me is wearing long, silvery grey socks - except that they are not his socks, they are his legs. Then I see that all of the runners have turned grey. I’m unable to tell whether this is the typical effect of the darkness, or my hallucinating mind. I begin to feel horribly claustrophobic, a sensation I have never felt before. Where is the end of this tunnel? I am too far in to turn back. I am torn between the sickening need to escape this underground prison and the overwhelming belief that by continuing to run I am only perpetuating my own miserable incarceration - after all, I ran in to this tunnel; what is to say that more running will get me out of it? I slow to a walk, which brings about the sensation of being drunk. Water is my alcohol, and every swig I take is making me more unsteady, more sick.

I pass a dimly visible sign - 17th mile - and pull myself together. A sign. A sign. I vow to run until the 20th mile, without stopping.

Before I reach the 18th mile, I fail.

But soon I begin to run again. Another technique - one that has always worked in training - serves me better: I promise to allow myself the treat of slowing down when, and only when, I reach the end of the tunnel. And soon I do see light. As hopeful rays of sunshine reach towards me, my mouth is suddenly refilled with the luxurious taste of that first orange, and then I am surfacing, out of the tunnel, an angelic wind singing against me, cold but perfect. I climb the slope out of the underpass and reach the top, ready to claim my prize of a rest. But I have just escaped Hell and climbed a hill after. Surely I am nothing short of exceptional? I speed up.

At the next refreshments table, an elderly man by the side of the road cheerfully pokes his walking stick across the tarmac in a well-meant attempt to remove some of the bottle tops from the road. I assume this means I’ve reached level two of the bottle gauntlet. For a moment I think the gentleman is an ill-advised blind man trying to find his way across to the other side. I wonder if the man with the newspaper is still on his island. I suppose he has a crossword to keep him occupied.

Soon I slow down again. I am stopping far more often than I would in training. I know I could run, but walking is easier. Where is my determination?

An Asian man passes me and calls back, “Come on, Superhero! Run!”

I grin at him, and take his advice.

Long before we reach the next refreshments table, my restored hunger has become insane-making. When the opportunity finally arises, I swipe at everything available, filling my mouth with raisins, oranges, whole gargantuan sugar cubes. I want to devour everything in my sight. Half a mile later, my muscles are delighted by the sugar kick as my feet pummel the ground beneath them, restless, powerful, unstoppable. Half a day later, my stomach wonders what the hell I was thinking.

The effect of the sugar quickly wears off, and I find myself slowing down again. The drunkenness worsens with every step. I need water, refreshment, but every drop of it exaggerates the sickening, narcotic sensation. I need water. Why am I drinking vodka?

The cold sweat of two men who brush past me is strangely refreshing. The warm sweat of another has the opposite effect. Another perspiring runner passes nearby, and the stench turns my stomach.

Shortly before we reach the Powerade table, a man with a sprinkler hose rains heavenly refreshment onto us. The eager Powerade volunteers misguidedly open bottles and poor unsatisfying amounts of electric blue fluid into plastic cups, most of which end up empty before they even reach the frantic runners’ mouths. I take a whole bottle, but find that the prospect of drinking it makes me feel nauseous, and I contribute to the most colourful of the bottle gauntlets, chucking an unopened Powerade into the road.

Miles 15 to 20 are by far the worst. Some runners from Brighton who I chatted to on the Metro on the way to the start line had warned me of this. I realise that the only thing that has got me through the marathon so far has been plotting this peculiar narrative as I go along - mentally recording the man with the paper, the screaming Frenchwoman, the abominable Rob Flatt - constructing delicious couplets - spinwheeling bottles and angelic singing winds. It is strange that reliving the task I am undertaking as I undertake it is what ultimately allows me to finish it.

I approach from behind a man who displays a request on the back of his vest: “Cheer me: go on Dave”. I remember the Asian man who called me a Superhero, and told me to run. I remember the thousands calling “allez!”. I pass close by Dave, and say nothing. I still don’t know why.

Walking again, I see in the distance a sign: 25th mile. A sign. A sign. I vow to run the last two miles, with all my heart, without stopping.

I succeed.

Most of the final two miles of the marathon are in what appears to be Parisian countryside - just me, the trees, and a few thousand other stubborn athletes. Then we turn a corner to be greeted by thousands more - not running or walking but cheering. The Sun is no longer peeking out from behind the branches of tall trunks, but upon us, warm and welcome. I spot the first non-conventionally dressed runner that I have seen during the race: a colourful clown dances along the barriers, wheezing into a screaming whistle and stirring up the excitable crowd. We turn a corner, and we are suddenly on the Champs Élysées. A banner, blissfully within reach, declares, “ARRIVÉE”. I raise my arms for the photographers as I cross the finish, but I feel curiously unable to smile. Looking at the photo later I can see that I was indeed smiling. I suspect my body was simply incapable of expressing the sheer relief that it was feeling at that moment. I can’t see Rob Flatt anywhere. I suspect he is still in that tunnel.

After the marathon, I queue for half an hour to be given the best massage I have ever received, by a cute French boy who, one by one, makes all five of the toes on my left foot crack with a gratifying CERUCK.

“How was it?” he asks.

“Never again,” I say. “Until the next time.”

(I finished in four hours, 16 minutes and 13 seconds.)
(Rob Flatt finished in three hours, 28 minutes and 59 seconds. I have yet to introduce myself to him.)