ALYSON DIXON will attempt to secure an Olympic qualifying time in this month’s Berlin Marathon after she proved her wellbeing with an excellent fourth-place finish in yesterday’s Morrisons Great North Run.

Dixon, who is a member of Sunderland Strollers, was comfortably the most impressive of the North-East contingent on the half-marathon course between Newcastle and South Shields as she finished less than five minutes behind runaway winner Mary Keitany in a time of 1:12.07.

Yesterday’s race was only supposed to be a warm-up for the Berlin Marathon in a fortnight’s time, an event that offers an early opportunity to claim the qualifying mark for next year’s Olympics in Rio.

However, after starting extremely strongly in the opening five kilometres, Dixon admits she found it difficult not to push herself to the limit as she matched strides with Gemma Steel for the first half of the race before her British team-mate eventually pushed on to claim second position.

“Finishing fourth in the Great North Run is pretty special, and when you’re a girl from Sunderland, it has even more meaning to it,” said Dixon, who suffered the heartbreak of having to pull out of last year’s Commonwealth Games marathon in Glasgow when she damaged her Achilles halfway through the race. “I’m really pleased with that.

“I’ve got Berlin in two weeks time, and under normal circumstances, I wouldn’t do a half-marathon two weeks out from a full. But it’s the Great North Run, and when you’re from the North-East, you can’t not do it.

“The plan was originally to go into it and run it really controlled at marathon pace, and use it to test a few things out with getting water bottles and things like that. But then after running a PB last week in the 10k, people were saying, ‘Well, you’re in good shape’.

“I was wrestling with myself. I spoke to Crammy (Steve Cram) and Paula (Radcliffe) before the race, and Crammy was saying, ‘Control yourself’ while Paula was saying, ‘Go for it’. I tried to go down the middle. It was a bit faster than marathon pace, but wasn’t eyeballs out.”

Steel’s second runner-up spot in succession underlined her growing standing in the world of distance running, although the Leicester athlete was unable to get close to winner Mark Keitany, who is rapidly establishing herself as a Great North Run legend.

Having broken the course record last year, Keitany dictated yesterday’s race from the outset, claiming the lead before the field crossed the Tyne Bridge and opening up a gap of almost a minute by the halfway stage.

She eventually finished almost three-and-a-half minutes clear of Steel, and while her time of 1:07.32 was slightly slower than last year’s mark, she is the first runner to successfully defend the women’s title since Scotland’s Liz McColgan in 1996.

Shelly Woods successfully defended her women’s wheelchair title, and by claiming a seventh Great North Run crown, the London 2012 silver medallist has moved just one win behind the record tally of eight victories set by Dame Tanni Grey-Thompson.

David Weir has six titles in the men’s equivalent, and the six-time Paralympic gold medallist demolished a strong field to cruise home in a time of 42:46 and win by almost two minutes from fellow Briton Simon Lawson.