Had Taylor Ahlgren not lost a bet with some friends back home in San Francisco, odds are that he probably wouldn’t have run Monday’s 117th Boston Marathon dressed head to toe in a zebra costume.

“It was a little hot in the zebra costume, but it was a great run,” the 31-year-old Ahlgren said. “I was looking for the lions and trying to stay away from the lions.

“I got a ton of support being in costume. I got everything from, ‘Hey, Zebra Man,’ to ‘Oh, Caveman,’ and about mile 24, I think they were calling me a zombie. So, yeah, the names got progressively worse as the run went on.”

There were no lions, of course, along the sidelines of the annual Hopkinton-to-Boston run, but the thousands of spectators that help make up the aura of the Boston Marathon is a scene many runners will tell you is incomparable with other marathons around the world.

“Nothing compares to Boston,” said Johanna Ludington, 24, of Portland, Ore., whose other marathon experiences include the Nike Women’s Marathon in San Francisco, and the Portland Marathon. “It’s just the atmosphere and the energy. It’s just unreal. There’s no other course I’ve ever been to where everybody is just so excited to have runners out there.”

For Australia native Jodi Obourne, running for her first time in the United States, the experience came on the heels of fellow countryman Adam Scott’s win at the Masters in Augusta, Georgia on Sunday, the first time an Australian golfer has won the green jacket.

“Everyone was yelling, ‘Go Australia,’ ‘Go Aussie.’ I actually got a lot of [Scott] comments along the way,” the 41-year-old Obourne said. “I’ve come from Australia where it’s been hot and humid, and raining, so to come into some cooler weather is fantastic.”

With temperatures in the 50’s, it was indeed a perfect day for running, though no course records were broken. Ethiopian Lelisa Desisa, and Kenyan Rita Jeptoo took home the 2013 crowns for the men and women, respectively.

Later on, it was the rest of the field’s turn to cross the finish line, as more and more runners made their way down Boylston Street as the time clock ticked into its third hour.

“It was awesome, it was the best run ever. It was a little downhill for me, but yeah, it was fun,” Andrew Henry, 30, from Snowmass Village, Colo. said with a smile. “I didn’t really train until like a month ago, so, probably should have started earlier.

“It’s fun having people around you the whole time. It gets the energy going.”

For some runners, like Eric Beidelman, 37, of Portsmouth, N.H., the results weren’t exactly where they had hoped they’d be at the beginning of the race. Then again, when you’re one of a group of runners who raised a more than $200,000 for the Run Tri Ride to End Alzheimer's, a record year for the Massachusetts-New Hampshire chapter, satisfaction has to come in more forms than a time.

“I took it slow the second half, not as well as I wanted to do, but beautiful day for it,” said Beidelman, who was running his fifth Boston Marathon. “Great weather, great crowd, you can’t beat it really. Enjoy it while you’re here.”

“Enjoyment” may not be the best word to sum up a grueling 26.2 miles, but satisfaction did indeed reign at the finish line of the Boston Marathon, where thousands of runners finished their quest for whatever reason it may have been.