Before I started running last January (and picked up my Nike+ iPod set), I only knew Paula Radcliffe was a runner — a good one, at that — who quit in the middle of the 2004 Olympic marathon. That's not a criticism. I just remember her crying on the side of the road with cameras buzzing around her... and no one really paying attention to the people actually running the race.Because I couldn't run a block without getting winded in 2004, I didn't disrespect the woman for quitting... I just didn't understand why anyone would run that far (I think she stopped around 22-23 miles) and just not finish. After you've watched Chris Legh try to crawl to the Ironman finish in 1997, you don't expect any elite endurance athlete to just quit. Even if you don't have a clue what they're going through.
But once I started running with my Nike+iPod, I began to really appreciate Paula Radcliffe: she congratulated me every time I reached a new distance record for myself! So, I started reading more about her.
At the time that I started running, she was having a baby (a girl named Isla). And today she won the NYC Marathon. Now that's some serious girl power.
