Subject of Biography: Radcliffe, Paula

Biography from Current Biography International Yearbook (2003) Copyright (c) by The H. W. Wilson Company. All rights reserved. 

As the world's fastest female marathoner, Paula Radcliffe is also one of Britain's most popular athletes, beloved as much for her losses as for her wins. A middle- and long-distance runner since her teens, Radcliffe was long considered "England's gallant loser; the plucky front-runner who lacked the closing speed to hold off her world-class rivals," Tom Barrett wrote for the Edmonton Journal (August 1, 2001). Known for setting a grueling pace, she often demonstrated a weakness in sprinting that left her unable to win many close 5,000- and 10,000-meter races. However, Radcliffe's positive attitude and disciplined perseverance endeared her to sports enthusiasts. After a heartbreaking fourth-place finish in the 10,000-meter race at the 2000 Summer Olympic Games in Sydney, Australia, one woman wrote in a fan letter to Radcliffe, "Your guts and determination embodied everything I want my daughter to learn about giving her all--in running but also in life," as quoted by the London Sunday Times (August 12, 2001). Finally, in late 2000, Radcliffe's rigorous training began to pay off: After winning the World Half-Marathon Championships in both 2000 and 2001, and the 2001 World Cross Country Championship long-course run, she began shifting her focus to longer runs. In 2002 she placed first in eight out of nine competitions, including the Flora London Marathon and the Chicago Marathon, at which she broke the women's world record. Radcliffe continued to defy expectations in 2003, when she defended her title at the London Marathon, shaving nearly two minutes off her previous world-record score. A highly competitive racer who runs more than 120 miles per week, Radcliffe has battled such personal impediments as exercise-induced asthma and anemia. (Her well-publicized habit of eating iron-rich ostrich meat has begun to increase interest in the delicacy in Britain.) The five-foot nine-inch, 120-pound runner is also known for her trademark style of bobbing her head back and forth during races, a habit she insists she has little control over. But Radcliffe's courage may be her most-celebrated feature. "It's wonderful when anyone is best in the world," David Moorcroft, a former 10,000-meter world-record holder, told Rachel Cooke for the Observer (December 1, 2002), "But Paula has achieved her level of excellence against all odds, when people were telling her she was a loser or that the future of distance running was in Africa." He added, "She's on the brink. The prospect of what lies ahead is absolutely mouth-watering." Paula Jane Radcliffe was born on December 17, 1973. The elder of two children of Peter Radcliffe, a beer brewery executive, and Patricia Radcliffe, a school headmistress, she was raised in Cheshire, in northwestern England, but when she was 11 the family moved south to Bedford. Her interest in running developed from an early age, when she watched her father train for marathons. "I was living in Kingsley, which is very near to Delamere Forest," she told Alan Jewell for the Liverpool Daily Post (September 13, 2001), "where he used to go running a lot. At weekends, we would take drinks and drop them off for him. I used to join in; I wouldn't go far but I really enjoyed it." At age nine she joined the Frodsham Harriers track club and was soon impressing her schoolmates with her track and field abilities. "At that age, I did a bit of everything; the high jump, sprinting and distance running, but I knew it was distance running I was best at, and wanted to do in the future," she explained to Jewell. After moving to Bedford, she joined the Bedford County Athletics Club and began training under the husband-and-wife team of Alec (sometimes referred to as Alex) and Rosemary Stanton, who have remained her coaches ever since. From the start, Radcliffe was an ambitious athlete with dreams of participating in the Olympics. "I remember watching the [1984] Los Angeles Olympics and thinking that's what I want to do," she recalled to Pat Butcher for the Financial Times (April 13, 2002). But Radcliffe was not an immediate running star. In 1986, at the age of 12, she participated in her first major race during the English minor girls cross-country championships in Leicester--and finished in 299th place. Determined to improve her abilities, however, she persisted with a regular training routine. Five years later, when she attended her first World Junior Cross Country championship, she finished 15th. "I thought, right, if I put the work in, I can do this," she told Pat Butcher, "and Alec [Stanton] said there's no reason why you shouldn't win this next year." The following year, in Boston, Massachusetts, Radcliffe was victorious in the same race, despite freezing weather. She also placed fourth in the 3,000-meter World Junior Championships in 1992 and was named the 1992 Junior Athlete of the Year by the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF). Even with her arduous track schedule, Radcliffe excelled in her academic studies, earning four A's on her high school A-level examinations. As she explained to Alan Jewell, "I wanted to do well at school, that was really important for a career. The running was something I enjoyed when I was fed up of revising--it was nice to be able to get out in the fresh air." She enrolled at Loughborough University in central England, where she undertook a degree in European studies, with concentrations in business and languages; Radcliffe, who is fluent in both German and French, earned her B.A. with first class honors in 1996. During her time at Loughborough, she made her academic work a priority, even as she was proving herself one of Britain's top young runners. In 1993 she placed seventh in the 3,000-meter World Championships, but a foot injury prevented her from competing at the Commonwealth Games and the European Championships in 1994. (The injury was serious enough that she was initially told it could jeopardize her running career, but she remained optimistic and focused on rebuilding her stamina.) "When some athletes are injured," she told Mike Rowbottom for the London Independent (August 12, 1995), "they can't even bear to read about the sport. But I deliberately didn't cut myself off from it." Because her parents were still active in the Bedford County Athletics Club, she was continually exposed to other runners. "Spending all that time in the pool, and having to go to races and watch had made me realise how much I enjoy athletics. You do realise that life goes on without running. You also realise your life is extremely empty without running." Radcliffe returned to competitive running in 1995, this time pushing herself even further. When she participated in the 1995 5,000-meter World Championships after only three months of training, she kept pace with the top runners for two-thirds of the race before losing steam. Although she placed fifth, she nearly collapsed from exhaustion and frustration after crossing the finish line. "Because I had missed so much I was really determined coming back," she told Mike Rowbottom. "But I wanted it all too soon, and I let the pressure of running in front of a home crowd get to me." Radcliffe placed fifth at the 1996 Summer Olympic Games in Atlanta, Georgia, where she again competed in the 5,000-meter event. Over the next several years, she placed fourth in the 1997 5,000-meter World Championship race, second in the 1997 World Cross Country Championships, fifth in the 1998 10,000-meter European Championship race, and second in the 1998 World Cross Country Championships. Radcliffe's tendency to place within the top five runners--but rarely win--was attributed to her inability to force a sprint in the final moments of a race, although she often maintained a demanding, metronomic pace from the start. She readily admitted that sprints were her weakness, and she continued exploring ways to improve. Radcliffe began altitude training, which is known to increase lung efficiency and the oxygen-carrying capacity of the blood, in the village of Font Romeu in southern France. In 1998 she won the European Cross Country Championships, and the following year she earned the silver medal in the 10,000-meter World Championship race in Seville, Spain--marking her first championship medal on a track. Although she did not win, Radcliffe told Doug Gillon for the Glasgow Herald (August 28, 1999) that she was pleased with her performance: "I ran the very best race I could have. . . . I have to run to my strengths, and one of these is that I can run through a lot of pain." Nevertheless, she added, "Fourth and fifth places were beginning to hang around my neck a bit." She also placed third in the 1999 World Cross Country Championships. Radcliffe won the Great North Run, a half-marathon in Newcastle, England, in 2000. She then participated in the 10,000-meter race at the Sydney Olympics. The race proved one of the most memorable--and disappointing--moments of her career: After setting a difficult pace of 72- to 73-seconds per lap and leading her competitors for 24 of the race's 25 laps, Radcliffe was outstripped in the final turn by three runners: the Ethiopians Gete Wami and Derartu Tulu and the Portuguese racer Fernanda Rebeiro. She finished in fourth place, losing her chance for an Olympic medal. Fans were stunned by the defeat, though they remained impressed with Radcliffe's endurance and seemingly indestructible spirit. Despite maintaining her characteristic poise after the event, Radcliffe was devastated by the loss. "I was totally gutted, physically and emotionally," she told Tim Layden for Sports Illustrated (October 14, 2002). "I had run so hard, and I still couldn't beat them." "That was the lowest point," her husband and manager, Gary Lough, told Rachel Cooke. "Oh, it was hard to sit and watch that happen. But you can be bitter or you can pick yourself up and get on with it--and within two months, she'd won a world title on the road. That says a lot about her. I couldn't have been so positive. I'd have hidden away." (Lough, a former 1,500-meter runner from Northern Ireland, was forced to retire from professional competition in 1997 due to injury. A friend of Radcliffe's since the two met at Loughborough University, he became Radcliffe's manager in 1997; the couple married in April 2000.) With the help of her coach and her physical therapist, Gerard Hartmann, who often tends to the runner full-time when she is in deep preparation for a race, Radcliffe revised some of her endurance training drills to improve her speed. In her next major race, Radcliffe won the 2000 World Half-Marathon Championship, held in Veracruz, Mexico. Radcliffe continued her winning streak at the World Cross Country Championships, held in Ostend, Belgium, in March 2001. There, she placed first in the long course (an eight-kilometer event), maintaining a lead against Wami throughout the race and fighting her off in the final 100 meters. The win was particularly satisfying for Radcliffe, who was able to prove her endurance. "I always wanted to win it in a sprint," she explained to Neil Wilson for the London Daily Mail (March 26, 2001), "because everybody said I couldn't." Although she came in second in the short course (a four-kilometer run) held the next day, Radcliffe remained pleased with both her gold and silver medals. "I had nothing to lose. I had won the [race] I wanted," she told Wilson. On the heels of her success in Belgium, Radcliffe was optimistic about her chances for a gold medal in the 2001 10,000-meter World Championship race, held in Edmonton, Canada; a gold medal in a track race would secure her title as world champion on the track, the road, and cross-country, all at the same time. (She had previously proved herself on the road and cross country in the 2000 World Half-Marathon Championships and the 2001 World Cross Country Championships, respectively.) In this race Radcliffe adopted a different approach to the run: Rather than take the lead from the start, she planned to wait until she was several laps in to accelerate her pace; however, the plan backfired when she moved ahead too late and was unable to outpace the Ethiopian runners Wami, Tulu, and Berhane Adere. Radcliffe finished the race in fourth place. "It was up to me to find the right time to go," she explained to Mike Rowbottom for the London Independent (August 9, 2001). "I got it a bit wrong." The disappointing loss erupted into something of a media spectacle when, in full view of the cameras, Lough loudly berated his wife for her performance after she crossed the finish line. Nearly in tears, Radcliffe pushed him away. The altercation made headlines around the globe, despite insistence from both Radcliffe and Lough that the incident was blown out of proportion. As Radcliffe told Pat Butcher, "We were both frustrated, and immediately afterwards Gary knew it was the wrong thing to say. My point was, you have a right to that opinion, but do it on the warm-up track afterwards." For his part, Lough conceded that his timing was poor, although he maintained that as Radcliffe's manager he often critiques her runs. "That kind of row hasn't just happened once," he told Rachel Cooke. "It happens all the time, it's just that was so public. I'm often, like, what do you think you're doing? Why are you trying to go wide?" Nevertheless, he offered a quick public apology, explaining to Cooke, "She's the runner. She makes the decisions. I was out of order." Radcliffe became embroiled in more controversy at the 2001 World Championships when she publicly rebuked the Russian runner Olga Yegerova, who had tested positive for the performance-enhancing drug erythropoietin (EPO) but was reinstated in the races on a technicality. As Yegerova lined up to compete in the 5,000-meter race, Radcliffe held up a sign that read "EPO Cheats Out" until it was confiscated by event officials. (Yegerova went on to win the race.) Radcliffe had been wearing a red ribbon during competitions to signify her support for mandatory blood testing for competitive runners since 1999, a habit she maintains. But in Edmonton Radcliffe took advantage of the opportunity to make her anti-drug stance more public. "It would have been hypocritical for me to sit back and say nothing," she explained to Jennifer Selway for the Express (January 21, 2002). "The problem won't go away, though some people thought it would be more sensible for me to keep quiet until I retire from competitive racing before I made my stand. Gary supported me, but I suppose it was a bit scary to rock the boat--you never know, there's a lot of money wrapped up in the drug thing." Soon after, David Moorcroft expressed his concerns that Radcliffe's strong anti-doping position could expose her as a "target" to spiking and other smear tactics. Radcliffe later admitted she would be watching her intake of food and drink carefully, particularly leading up to her races, to ensure against any deliberate contamination from her adversaries. Nevertheless, she insisted she was proud of her activism on the issue. "It's the credibility of the sport," she told Alan Jewell. "People want to believe what they are watching is an honest race. . . . We need athletes to say, 'We're not all doing it, we don't condone it, we don't accept it.'" Through 2003 she has continued her campaign against performance-enhancing substances, including calling for the lifetime ban from competition of the British runner Dwain Chambers, who tested positive for THG, a newly recognized synthetic anabolic steroid. "It's very sad for British sport that one of our athletes has tested positive," she told the press, as quoted by Wayne Veysey for the London Evening Standard (October 24, 2003), "but we must be strong and take action if anyone is found guilty. The scandal over THG may be the best thing that could have happened to athletics." After winning her second World Half-Marathon Championship, in October 2001, Radcliffe announced that she would be participating in the Flora London Marathon, set for April 2002. During her marathon training she won three shorter events: the Campaccio Cross Country race, held in Milan, Italy; the "World's Best 10-km" road race, held in Puerto Rico; and the long course in the World Cross Country Championships, held in Dublin, Ireland. Radcliffe's winning performance in the London Marathon, when she completed the 26.2-mile course in 2:18:56 (two hours, 18 minutes, and 56 seconds), secured her place as one of the world's fastest runners. In addition to winning the race, which was the first full marathon that Radcliffe had ever run, she actually completed the second half of the course in less time than the first. Shaving more then three minutes from her pace, she ran the second half in only 1:07:52. Radcliffe's victory had psychological benefits, as she explained to Natasha Woods for the Sunday Herald (July 28, 2002): "London did an enormous amount for me. Something special happened there and it gave me this enormous well of confidence to draw on. I always knew I was going about things the right way in training, but London reinforced those beliefs." Following her success in London, Radcliffe placed second in the Monaco Grand Prix 3,000-meter race; first in the 2002 Commonwealth Games 5,000-meter race; first in the 2002 European Championships 10,000-meter race; and first in London's Richmond Park 10-km road race. In the middle of that year, her accomplishments were questioned by a French sports magazine, L'Equipe, which insinuated that her recent victories were due to performance-enhancing drugs. One French reporter noted, as quoted by Steven Downes for the Ireland Sunday Tribune (August 11, 2002), "From last year she has gone, voom, suddenly three, four, five steps up. And you have to ask the question why." Radcliffe rebutted the claims immediately, taking the unprecedented step of releasing her full testing record for the previous 12 months; all five tests, two of which involved blood analysis, showed her to be free of any banned substances. In addition, several physiologists came to Radcliffe's defense, noting that female long-distance runners tend to reach their physical peak in their late 20s, a fact that could explain her recent improvements. Although Radcliffe acknowledged that the charges may have been inevitable, given the current climate of drug accusations within the sport, she was nonetheless disappointed. "It upsets me because it is something that is very important to me," she told Downes. "I know myself and the people around me know that it is all because of the hard work I put in." Radcliffe's final race of the year, the Chicago Marathon, on October 13, 2002, marked perhaps her biggest achievement to date. In addition to winning the race, she broke the women's marathon world record with her winning time of 2:17:18. (The old record, set at the 2001 Chicago Marathon by Catherine Ndereba, was 2:18:47.) Crossing the finish line more than two minutes ahead of the runner-up, Radcliffe completed the second half of the race 44 seconds faster than the first, even after slowing down in the 24th mile due to stomach cramps. "The world record is what I knew I was capable of doing and what I was working for since London," she told Philip Hersh for the Chicago Tribune (October 14, 2002). It is estimated that Radcliffe took home nearly $600,000 in prizes and bonuses for her record-breaking run. On the heels of her enormous success in 2002, Radcliffe became the recipient of numerous honors, being named the Sunday Times Sportswoman of the Year, the BBC Sports Personality of the Year--for which she beat out British soccer player David Beckham by a margin of five-to-one--the IAAF World Female Athlete of the Year, and the Athletics Writers' Association Female Athlete of the Year; she also won the 2002 Women of the Year Outstanding Achievement Award. In June 2002 she was also named a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE), an award bestowed by Britain's Queen Elizabeth II. In early 2003 Radcliffe and Lough spent 10 weeks in Albuquerque, New Mexico, where she maintained a demanding training schedule in preparation for her second Flora London Marathon appearance. She took a break from training, however, to defend her title in Puerto Rico's "World's Best 10-km" race, this time beating the world record by eight seconds with a winning time of 30 minutes, 21 seconds. Bouncing back from a training accident in March when she collided with a cyclist and sustained a dislocated jaw, cuts, and bruises, Radcliffe shattered expectations at the London Marathon on April 13, 2003 with "the most stunning endurance performance in history, male or female," Doug Gillon wrote for the Glasgow Herald (April 14, 2003). In addition to winning the race, she beat her own world record, shaving nearly two minutes off her time in the 2002 Chicago Marathon. (Marathon organizers had placed eight male pacesetters in the women's race, thus qualifying the event as a "mixed" field eligible for world-best records.) With a time of 2:15:25, Radcliffe maintained a formidable average pace of five minutes and 10 seconds per mile. Despite her record-breaking showing, she told one reporter for the London Independent (April 14, 2003), "When I run it's not about the clock, it's about a battle with myself to see how fast I can go." Radcliffe's speed and endurance may have shocked running enthusiasts, but it came as little surprise to those familiar with her training habits. "I have worked with 42 Olympic medallists and I don't know anyone else who works so hard nor is so dedicated to what they do," Gerard Hartmann told the Independent. "The other girls are going to have to start thinking of ways to bridge the gap because I know Paula can run faster again." Peter Matthews, a leading historian of long-distance running, declared Radcliffe's victory "simply the greatest achievement in the history of the sport." As he told Ian Chadband for the London Evening Standard (April 14, 2003), "They'll argue that she hasn't won an Olympic gold medal . . . but the purists would say she doesn't have anything more to do to prove her greatness. For me, she's unquestionably our finest athlete." At the last moment, Radcliffe pulled out of the August 2003 World Championships in Paris due to a nagging shin injury and bronchitis. Disappointing many track and field fans, some journalists declared the women's distance runs as uninteresting without her presence. Radcliffe was fully recovered for the Great North Run in September, however, which she won in 1:05:40, the fastest time ever for a female runner in the event. Two weeks later she was victorious in the IAAF Half Marathon, in Vilamoura, Portugal, by the largest margin ever recorded in the event, although she missed the mark of a world record in the half marathon by almost a minute. Nevertheless, the win capped an "unparalleled 12-month period during which she has raced seven times, won on every occasion and set five world records," noted an article on the IC Cheshire Web site. She turned down an invitation to run the New York City Marathon on November 2, 2003, instead competing in the Ekiden, a marathon-distance road relay in Chiba, Japan, later that month. Radcliffe still has her eye on an Olympic triumph and has already expressed her intention to compete in the marathon at the 2004 Summer Olympic Games in Athens, Greece. However, due to the marathon's scheduled 6 p.m. start time, the stifling summer heat, and the air pollution along Athens' historic course, Radcliffe has not ruled out competing in the 10,000-meter race instead of the marathon. In addition to her marathon record, Radcliffe has set numerous benchmarks for British and European runners at distances of 3,000, 5,000, and 10,000 meters. In 1997 she received the British Sports Writers Reebok Trophy and was named the British Athletic Federation Athlete of the Year. Radcliffe served as the British Athletics Team Women's Captain from 1998 through 2002. In 1999 she was named the Sunday Times Sportswoman of the Year and the British Athletic Federation and Sports Writers Female Athlete of the Year, a title she also earned in 2001. She was recently named the woman athlete of the year for the third year in a row by the British Athletics Writers' Association. Radcliffe and Lough have homes in Loughborough, England, and Font Romeu, France. They often spend winters in Albuquerque, New Mexico, where Radcliffe has the benefits of warm-weather altitude training. The couple hopes to begin a family after Radcliffe's expected participation in the 2004 Olympic games. Of her plans for a long-term running career, Radcliffe once told Selway, "I'll only give up when I stop enjoying it. And though I might give up racing, I'll never give up running. It just gives me so much joy." --K.D. 

Suggested Reading: Chicago Tribune Sports p1 Oct. 6, 2002, with photos; Edmonton Journal D p3 Aug. 1, 2001; Ireland Sunday Tribune p3 Aug. 11, 2002, with photo; Irish Times p57 July 28, 2001; Liverpool Daily Post p28 Sep. 13, 2001, with photo; London Sunday Times Sport p16 Oct. 13, 2002, Sport p16 Apr. 13, 2003; London Times Sport Mar. 18, 2002, Sport p50 Mar. 7, 2003; Observer p23 Aug. 2, 2002, Sports Magazine p14 Dec. 1, 2002; Sports Illustrated p66 Oct. 14, 2002, with photo

Profession: Olympic athletes; Runners (Athletes); Athletes; Sports people; Track athletes