Paula prepared to risk all

Let's hope Paula Radcliffe will look happier than this aftert he 10,000m

14 April 2012

Whetther you would consider her courageous or crazy, there could surely be no argument that Paula Radcliffe would be taking the biggest risk of her career by deciding to slog for the Olympic 10,000 metres gold medal in Athens tomorrow night.

Just five nights after she was left blubbing by the side of the road four miles from the finish of the marathon, exhausted to the point of breakdown, you would have not waged a penny on this pitiful, inconsolable figure making her racing comeback this season.

Yet as her name was officially confirmed on the entry list for tomorrow's 10,000m final, it seemed she was increasingly edging towards the idea of seeking the 'redemption' that success in the 25-lap race could offer.

That's what the Olympics can do to you. In the days since the trauma unfolded, Radcliffe must have looked at her life and concluded that she had just this one last chance to win the ultimate gold medal, the one which might define her career. By Beijing, she would be 34 and her purple patch would probably have long gone.

However, after such a debilitating experience on Sunday, the rest of us can fairly ask what good it could possibly do Radcliffe to put herself through another unforgiving night of pain when surely she can't be in the proper shape, either physically or mentally, to challenge for the medal she so desperately seeks.

If she pulled it off, you would have to rate it just about the most fantastic rebound in the annals of British sport. Seb Coe's father and coach Peter, reckoned that watching his boy return to win the Olympic 1500m title in Moscow following his shattering loss in his No1 event, the 800m, was like watching a man return from the dead.

Yet Coe's was only a comeback showcasing mental strength. Much more is being asked of Radcliffe because, even if she somehow manages to banish the demons of uncertainty which she may now be plagued with after the marathon, she cannot know whether the sheer physical toll of Sunday's race would crush her.

In the past, her 10,000m hopes have so often been dashed by the brilliant Ethiopians who hung on to whatever front running pace she cut out and then killed her in a last lap sprint. They still run and hunt as a team and Radcliffe has never yet found an escape on the track.

It takes a leap of the imagination to believe she will be able to summon her best form and relentless drive to break them from the front. Yet because it is Radcliffe, a nagging feelingpersists that we should not write off this mission completely.

As David Moorcroft, the man who runs British athletics, said here yesterday: "Conventional wisdom says it is not possible but Paula has a habit of making the impossible possible. If her heart says it is right then it is probably the right thing to do."

That has to be the hope. Radcliffe has received plenty of open letter advice from all quarters during these past few days of soul searching and most of the best intentioned stuff has been to tell her that this is a challenge too far.

Denise Lewis, a woman who found the gold which Radcliffe seeks, put it simply: "If Paula was my sister, I'd tell her to come home. Her heart was broken by Sunday's disappointment."

Yet for Radcliffe, perhaps there is only one real cure. She has to get out there and run that broken heart out one more time.

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Paula prepared to risk all

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