Over 39,400 people completed the race on 23rd AprilMingles27

The London Marathon is one of the highlights of my year. I don’t run it – at least not yet – but I love watching it on the TV.

This can, in part, be attributed to my entirely indiscriminate fascination with live sports. Give me five minutes watching the darts, and I’m shouting one-hundred-and-eight-y along with the rest of them. After just one Grand Prix, I’m tutting at the speed of drivers’ pit stops. Judo, football, fencing, rugby, the hammer throw – if it’s on, and I’ve got nothing better to do, I’ll watch it. I even once found myself watching the European Bowls Championship.

But, in the case of the Marathon, there’s more to it than that. I’m not so fussed about the elite runners. Sure, I watch them. And sure, half an hour into the BBC coverage, I’m chatting about PBs and ‘going sub-two-twenty’ like I’m Steve Cram. But that’s not why I set an alarm to watch it every year.

“One of my favourite things to witness is a middle-aged person hobbling at mile 18 – maybe crying, maybe vomiting, but still going”

No, what I love about the Marathon is all the normal people.

I love the people who are running it for the first time, no idea what they’re letting themselves in for. I love the old hands who run it every year. I love the police officers running dressed as dishwashers to raise money to fight heart disease. I love the electricians going for the world record in running the Marathon while juggling fruit. I love the teachers moonwalking the course in support of Cancer Research. (Maybe ‘normal’ people isn’t the right term...)

But most of all, what moves me about the Marathon – or indeed, really any long-distance race – is all the people who have decided to run it, perhaps on a whim, perhaps after committed pestering from friends, just... to see if they can.

And the really, really great bit is that, nine times out of ten, it turns out: they can. One of my favourite things to witness is a middle-aged person hobbling at mile 18 – maybe crying, maybe vomiting, but still going. Some of these people have amazing, inspirational stories behind their run, but I’m not so bothered about those: for me, it’s really just about the fact that they’re there, putting their body through something truly hideous, because they believe they can, or that they might be able to, or that it’ll be a funny story even if not.

I have never run a marathon. I run, and I’d like to think I’ll get there one day, but right now, the idea of 26.2 miles is unthinkable. Sometimes, I wonder if it can really be so bad – thousands of people do it! – but then I get to three miles and feel like stopping.

And that’s why the Marathon, to me, is so special: it is, by my reckoning, the one thing that thousands of people do that remains extraordinary. It is a feat of human endurance that, year on year, people who’ve barely run before decide to sign up for. It is inspiring, sometimes gruesome, but really quite magical