I cross out third place in front of the head referee

I hereby state that at 12:41 I struck out third place on the finish list with a red marker, in front of the head referee, and that I did it knowing the prize ceremony was at one o'clock sharp. My name is Aníbal Sotoca, I am fifty-four and I have been timing road races since 1998: I am the one who lays the mats, connects them and signs the results. Without that signature, the federation publishes nothing.

The race was the Ledesma Half, twenty-one kilometres and ninety-seven metres, eight hundred and twelve numbers. I lay three mats: one at the start, one at kilometre twelve and one at the finish. A mat is a strip of rubber with antennas inside; when a runner steps on it, the chip on the race number answers and the computer records the time to the hundredth of a second. It does not measure speed or effort. It only records what time each chip passed each point.

At 12:33 I closed the finish window and pulled up the men's podium to print it. First, Dani Sanchidrián, 1:09:12. Second, Iker Bermejo, 1:11:56. Third, Rubén Otazu, number 214, 1:13:42.

I checked the third man's split out of habit, because splits are the first thing I read out over the loudspeaker. Rubén Otazu had stepped on the kilometre-twelve mat at 58:11.

From there to the finish is nine kilometres and ninety-seven metres. Between 58:11 and 1:13:42 there are fifteen minutes and thirty-one seconds. I did the sum three times on my phone because I did not believe it: that is nine kilometres at thirty-five kilometres an hour. A well-trained cyclist goes that fast on the flat. The half marathon world record runs at a little over twenty-two.

And I thought about saying nothing. I really did think about it, over the three minutes it took me to walk from the van to the tent: close the file, read out the podium and let somebody else look at it on Monday. I have done worse to get home earlier.

I went to find Noelia Peñas, the head referee the federation appoints for each race. She is the one who validates the course, resolves protests and, at the end of the day, vouches for the fact that the race was a race. She was in the organisers' tent with the prize list and an open box of trophies.

"I have a problem with the third man," I said, and put the sheet on top of the box. "His splits do not hold up."

She read it with her glasses on the tip of her nose. Noelia has twenty years in this and did not need the arithmetic explained.

"His chip may have fallen off and somebody else picked it up," she said.

"Then the time is not his either."

"Or your mat at twelve may have caught him late."

That one I had already checked. The kilometre-twelve mat registered seven hundred and ninety-one runners that morning without a single gap, and the splits of the first two and of the fourth match their finishing times to the second. If my mat were running late, it would be late for everyone. To cross one mat at 58:11 and the next at 1:13:42 you have to have covered nine kilometres in fifteen and a half minutes. Nobody does that.

I showed it to her on the laptop screen, which I had carried to the tent under my arm. Besides the time, the finish mat stores how strongly each chip answers: you can see whether the runner stepped in the middle or along the edge. Number 214's was a clean read, the kind you get stepping dead centre. And on the finish video, which I film myself with a fixed camera on the arch to settle close finishes, Rubén Otazu comes in down the right-hand lane at 1:13:42, alone, with nobody within fifteen metres and the face of a man who has just been running.

"Right," said Noelia, and she went on looking at the screen longer than she needed to.

"Aníbal," she said, dropping her voice, "I have the mayor, the town band and two coaches at one o'clock. Give me the podium, we take the photograph, and we sort this out on Monday with the committee. Nobody is going to die over a cup."

"If I sign that list, on Monday the committee has a document signed by me saying that man ran twenty-one kilometres."

"A sheet of paper, Aníbal. That is what I am asking you for."

"I sign what my machine measures. And my machine says nine kilometres are missing between the two mats."

We both stood there looking at the box of trophies. I knew what she was thinking, because it had crossed my mind too: Rubén Otazu is thirty-one, a welder on the Ledesma industrial estate, and he runs in the factory club's shirt. I know him from five or six races. He was playing for a thirty-euro cup and a photograph in the village group chat.

I also knew the fourth man's name. Asier Larrañaga, 1:15:03, with a cramp in his calf from the fifteenth kilometre. He was thirty metres from the tent, sitting on the kerb, taking off his shoes. He was the one who was going to go home without finding out that he had come third.

Noelia looked at the clock in the tent. 12:39.

"If you cross it out, the ceremony still happens at one," she said. "With the corrected list, no announcements over the loudspeaker, and nobody talking to the local press until I have talked to the committee. And on Monday I am the one who faces the committee."

She took the sheet, read it again and handed it back to me.

"You cross it out. It is your signature."

I took the red marker out of my jacket pocket and struck out the line for 214 in front of her. Underneath I wrote the three names moved up by hand: Sanchidrián, Bermejo, Larrañaga. I put the time, 12:41, and my initials beside it, which is how you correct a record once it has been printed.

Noelia called Rubén Otazu over the loudspeaker, by name and number, and waited for him standing up. He came walking slowly, still wearing his finisher's medal. He looked at the two figures she was showing him and said the only thing he said all morning: "The mat at twelve was in the wrong place." He took off the medal, left it on the table and walked off towards the car park.

At 13:00 the prizes were given out with the corrected list. Asier Larrañaga climbed onto the third step without knowing why, because nobody explained anything to him until afterwards, and he stood there staring at the cup with the face of a man who thinks there has been a mistake.

I did not stay for the photograph. I went back to the van, unplugged the laptop from the finish mat and took the raw split file with me, the one nobody prints, with the seven hundred and ninety-one time stamps from kilometre twelve. I copied it onto two separate memory sticks, put one in the envelope with the record for the committee and the other in the glove box. Then I rolled up the three mats, starting with the one at twelve.