Life was looking up really. My friends still liked me, the job was going reasonably well, I had narrowly avoided death at the tentacles of a rogue jellyfish off the coast of Australia, and my parents had bought me a food processor for Christmas. And then came the ludicrous urge to ruin my life by attempting to run 26 miles and 385 yards surrounded by a rhinoceros, builders dressed as nurses, policemen from Bangor and other hideousness.
Just a few unwise moments of thoughtlessness have led now to a grinding commitment: I am locked in to months of dread and a dreadful experience. Once committed to running a marathon, it's hard to get out of it without dying or at least losing a foot. The charity expects, your sponsors expect, your friends expect and desire pain.
In the next 12 weeks I am to run 390 miles, in a total of around 60 hours. That's the training plan laid down by the official London marathon web site. If you want to complete the 42.195 kms you should follow the plan, and stick to it - give up three nights a week to jogging plus your Saturday morning when all is required is a gentle two to three-hour trot. If I follow the plan by the morning of the race I will have run the equivalent of the distance from London to the Rowardennan Hotel on the banks of Loch Lomond, just north of Glasgow, at an average 6.5 miles an hour.
They say I'll get used to it and enjoy it. Bitterly cold evenings, ice underfoot, driving rain and no beer will become nothing short of one big party. Rather than arrive home to a cheery invite to the pub from my flat mate Fran, I am instead to enjoy running followed by carrot juice, raw vegetables and a handful of sand. The occasional cigarettes I smoke have now gone. The late nights will stop shortly.
Only the shopping bit has provided some relief. A new pair of trainers (see below), a thermal long sleeved top, some blue shorts and top socks: £113.50 on the road with a free official marathon stopwatch to measure my agony.
• Marathon man will run as a weekly column until the London marathon on April 22.
