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It began with the pull of an oar and ended with the pedal of a BMX bike, mind-blowing bounces off a trampoline mat, and man and beast soaring over fences sandwiched in between.
It involved four bus trips, three train journeys, one tram ride and a single stint on the Paris Metro as well as plenty of running.
The brief was simple… to witness four Team GB Olympic gold medals in four different events in a single day at the Paris Olympics: rowing, trampolining, team showjumping and BMX racing.
In the end, it was a combination of Britain’s rivals, the occasionally fragile Paris transport system and Emmanuel Macron, who all tried their hand in derailing me. But more on the French president later.
The day began at Vaires-sur-Marne, the venue for the rowing regatta. Former Olympic champions Katherine Grainger and Moe Sbihi were already on site, both confident that two GB golds were at least attainable.
In the women’s lightweight double sculls, Emily Craig and Imogen Grant were unbeaten in 11 international regattas since being pipped to a medal in Tokyo by 0.01seconds. The one unknown, argued Grainger, in their quest for gold was the challenge of Romania.
Tom George and Ollie Wynne-Griffith, unbeaten this season, also had gold in their sights in the earlier men’s pair, two shots at getting me off to a winning start.
“The boys are all about power and need to get off strong,” explained Sbihi, “pull out a length lead at 1500m and see if that’s enough as they don’t seem to have that strong sprint finish.”
In the final few strokes of a 2,000m race, agonisingly they were passed. Silver.
Barely half an hour later, Grant and Craig were racing together for the last time before the event is scrapped from the Olympics and Grant begins her career as a doctor a few days later.
Briefly, the Romanians threatened to ruin the farewell before Craig and Grant put the hammer down.
With gold No1 sealed, I ran towards the bus, which pulled away almost immediately and fortuitously as I arrived on the platform at Torcy train station, the doors open for my train to gold attempt No2… Bryony Page in the trampolining.
Page set her sights on joining the circus after the Games hopefully with a gold to add to a silver and bronze from previous Games, but was a lowly fifth in qualifying.
For the final, she had the most difficult routine on paper. Occasionally she veered off course but the hope was that the complexity was sufficient. It took a lifetime for her scores and that of the final competitor to emerge on the big screen. When they did, she collapsed prostrate in celebration.
Trampolining to team showjumping was the toughest leg, Metro Line 6 to Montparnasse and a connecting train towards Versailles. One train was leaving in three minutes, another 17 minutes later, the latter too late for my needs.
So, I flew up the escalators to the bemusement of fellow passengers and snuck onto the train just before the doors closed behind me.
The third round of competition was about to start ahead of my final mode of transport there, a two-stop tram journey.
Once I arrived, there were just five riders left to go. I made it in time but the path ahead of me was blocked by the French president’s security detail.
The blue-suited officers were in danger of denying me part three in this quartet quest. In a mismatch of French and English, I explained my predicament and was eventually, begrudgingly, allowed through to the stands.
Britain led in the gold-medal position after Ben Maher picked up a one-second time penalty and Harry Charles went clear.
Charles had been just 13 years old when his father Peter won team gold in London 2012 in the same event with Maher and Scott Brash, the other British rider and last to go in the entire competition.
To the backdrop of the Palace of Versailles, Brash rattled fences but none came down, and GB had another gold.
It was the first occasion there was sufficient time to speak to the gold medalists. Maher and Brash revealed they call Charles ‘Bieber’ because of his youthful likeness to the Canadian crooner.
There was no shortage of time to get to the BMX racing and I got talking to one of Beth Shriever’s support team, who was certain that gold was attainable and talked of the inner calm of the athlete, on the walk from another bus stop there.
She had already won all three of her qualifying rounds and repeated the feat in the semi-finals. In such a volatile event, this looked like the biggest banker of the four.
But come the final, the start went awry, Shriever was left scrapping for the minor placings. And agonisingly in my last event of the day I lost the Midas touch.
