Paula Radcliffe waved almost all the way as she brought her competitive marathon career to an end on Sunday but it was a day in London where Portugal’s Ana Dulce Felix made her own good impression over the 26.2 miles.
Felix had entered the race with a personal best of 2:25:40 and for stages she was leading a strong field. While the group of African runners were lining up behind to her challenge, the Portuguese produced the performance of her life over the distance.
As Ethiopian Tigist Tufa won in 2:23:22, Felix ended eighth and leading European in a best of 2:25:15.
The time was just one second outside of the mark in which France’s Christelle Daunay won gold at last summer’s European Athletics Championships in Zurich and while London is a much different course, it is all about improvement.
The decision of Felix to move to the marathon is looking a good one as she was a place ahead of Belarusian Volha Mazuronak who had a brilliant run bringing her personal best time down by eight minutes as she was ninth in 2:25:36.
Great Britain’s Radcliffe, the world record-holder who started with the mass runners, bowed out in 2:36:55 and she was overcome with the occasion.
She said: "It was just amazing the whole way round. I wore sunglasses to keep a lid on my emotions and they definitely hid some tears along the way."
