British Paula Radcliffe set a new world championships record of 2:20:57. She led from start to finish over the 42km course. Kenya’s defending champion Catherine Ndereba took the silver in 2:22:01 and Romania’s Constantina Tomescu the bronze.

The record was over two minutes quicker than Emil Zatopek ran to win the men’s marathon here at the 1952 Olympic Games. When Norway’s Grete Waitz won in Helsinki at the world championships 22 years ago she was more than seven minutes slower.