It is a far cry from her days as a world-class marathon runner. Back then, there was no confusion in her head. She just ran as fast as she could for as long as she could, her head bobbing as she went. In her prime, when she was invariably accompanied by her insistent husband and coach Gary Lough, whose noisy critique of her would echo down any course, she rarely gave public opinion on anything beyond the venue of her next race.
But here’s the thing about Radcliffe: sadly, when attempting to make her mark in Olympic competition, something always seemed to intervene. Incredibly she does not possess a single Olympics medal of any hue. She came fourth in the 1996 5,000 metres, fifth in the 10,000 metres in 2000 and in Athens in 2004, when she was the overwhelming favourite to land marathon gold, she succumbed to heat exhaustion and did not finish. And that is without mentioning the toilet break in the 2005 London Marathon that came, in its awkward comedic value, to define her. For the wider British public she was never a heroine, always a might have been.
Or rather a should have been. If things had gone differently, her wider standing would be on a par with that of Mo Farah, a serial winner. After all, when she did manage to turn it on, she was extraordinary: she held the record for the 26-mile distance for an incredible 16 years, until it was finally broken by a Kenyan athlete wearing the latest iteration of carbon soled shoes. Radcliffe was inevitably asked about Brigid Kosgei’s footwear when her record was smashed in 2019, and was gracious in acknowledging that had she had access to similar advantages back in her prime she would have seized the opportunity.
But she never had that chance. And, perhaps frustrated by the number of times she seemed unable to control conditions; or emotions; or bowel movements when attempting to acquire the competitive bullion her talents suggested she should, these days she seems to have evolved into a go-to guest for any broadcast interviewer hoping to generate a little controversy. The sadness for Paul Radcliffe is that, just as happened when she went for Olympic gold, in her new career as a controversialist, she never quite gets it right.
