Paula Superb Radcliffe wins Great South

Britain's Paula Radcliffe looked in fine form ahead of next week's New York Marathon as she won the 10-mile Great South Run in a British record time.

Radcliffe, competing for the first time since her disappointment at the Beijing Olympics, won in 51 minutes 11 seconds.

At one point the 34-year-old looked set to break the world record, but narrowly missed out by 21 seconds.

"I'm just pleased to be back racing. It's all about next week, I wanted to get in the racing feel," she said.
The Briton had said she would use the south-coast run to "blow away the cobwebs" ahead of the defence of her New York Marathon title.

That she certainly did, beating Jill Boltz's British record of 51 mins 41 secs achieved in New York 17 years ago.

"I felt in the last two miles it was going to be really windy, so I saved a little bit for that. Actually, it wasn't as bad down the sea front as I was psyched up for it to be," she commented.

Radcliffe, who finished 23rd in the marathon at the Olympics after her build-up to Beijing was hampered by a stress fracture of her left thigh, showed no signs of fatigue.

She quickly stamped her authority over her rivals by racing through the second mile in 4 mins 57secs to open up a massive lead.

"I didn't want to totally hammer it because I've a more important race next week but at the same time I felt good running it and didn't feel I left anything out there," she said.

"Generally I wouldn't put myself on the line unless I felt I was OK. There are always little niggles in any marathon build-up - any marathon runner will tell you that.

"But when you know you've got the weeks of training and basically done the best job to get there, it's kind of fun to go racing."

Portugal's Jessica Augusto was a distant second in 53min 15secs, while Great North Run runner-up Magdalane Mukunzi of Kenya was five secs further back in third place.

In the men's race, Bernard Kipyego won in an unofficial time of 46mins 42seconds.

The Kenyan crossed the line ahead of Ireland's Martin Fagan and his compatriot and defending champion Luke Kibet.