per cent humidity reduced my pace to a sweat-sodden slouch. The road wound up from the coast, through canyons hewn from ancient corals and draped with curtains of vines. Ten minutes on this modest little hill and I was gasping. My legs were cast from

Why I should have imagined that a 14-mile run along the Cleveland Way in August might be good training for the 105-mile Jordan Desert Cup, remains a mystery. Perhaps I reasoned, not unreasonably, that August = Summer = Heat

and tracks that were supposed to lead us to the ridge of the Malverns.Steeple chase: the race was run against a backdrop of villages, churches and rolling hillsI suppose propelling us up a 1:4 incline bearing 10kg rucksacks at the height of a heatwave

.And yet the intense feeling of relief that overwhelmed me on that occasion was nothing compared to the all-suffusing ecstasy I experienced as I tottered off Queensboro Bridge into Manhattan at Mile 16 of the New York City Marathon.It was the contrast, I

the first race in 1979.Horses, having twice as many legs as people, invariably win – despite compulsory vet inspections. This is just as well for sponsors William Hill, because they’re offering £20,000 to any runner who beats the horses to the finish line

it will never catch, I am reduced to the ruin who scratches out these sorry lines for you tonight.Was it only 20 years ago that, fresh of face and fleet of foot, I carved out my daily mile around the South Circular, from Clapham Common to Streatham Hill? Behold

emptied his bladder at strategically important sites. Nor was I dragged across the fast lane of the A1 in pursuit of a one-eared ginger tom. I was spared a 30-minute battle of wills in the woods for possession of the decomposing corpse of a squirrel

.“It’s me back,” muttered Big Ron. “It hasn’t been right since London.”Good Lord, someone had actually run a race! Perhaps there was hope for us yet!“You never told me you were doing the London, Ron. How did you get on?”“Not this year,” he snapped. “1996.”“1994

Yesterday was a monumentally significant one. I tottered out of the house with the traditional Sunday morning hangover and Oscar the dog, and swayed blearily down the hill to meet the usual suspects – Highgate’s equivalent of the Chelsea Pensioners

and Abbot already enquire, “Pint of cider, Andy?” as I stagger into the pub at 6.50, still shaking from the lunatic race up the A1 on the Ducati.Life in Litlington is like an endless edition of the Archers. Nothing wrong in that. I remember doing