The marathon was one of the original modern Olympic events in 1896 and more than 800 marathons are contested throughout the world each year.

How it works: This is a reading comprehension exercise. Before you can answer any of the questions in this exercise you should read the relevant articles. You can find the articles in your right hand side by clicking on the 'Articles' tab. Each question is labeled with the article number to which the question applies. For example, a question starting with A1 - XXXX refers to article number 1.