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PAULA Radcliffe signalled her intent to win Olympic marathon gold after declaring she wants to stay unbeaten for the rest of her career.

Ten months after giving birth to daughter Isla and more than two years since last competing over 26.2 miles, Radcliffe returned to marathon running in spectacular fashion by winning the IMG New York City marathon.

Of her eight starts, the British world record holder has finished seven victorious, with her dramatic failure to complete the Olympic marathon in Athens in 2004 her only blip.

With her pregnancy timed to fall between Athens and Beijing next summer, Radcliffe said maintaining her 100 per cent success rate in finished races would be an important goal.

I'd love to be able to do that,'' Radcliffe said. Yes, I'm proud of that. I think that I have found my event in the marathon and certainly I think that helps me to dictate the end of a race because I do have pride and I'm not going to let someone beat me.

I'm going to give everything I have right to the line.'' Radcliffe led almost from start to finish to hold off old foe Gete Wami of Ethiopia by 23 seconds following a fascinating duel over the closing two miles.

But the Briton's competitive instincts for the race had been sparked 12 months earlier as she watched from the stands when husband Gary Lough ran in the famous race.

She said: I guess when I was sitting here pregnant last year, in my mind I was thinking I'd love to be back here racing.

But I had a really great reason not to be.

I guess in my mind I thought I'd be back racing a little bit before now. But I knew that people can have difficulties coming back after having a baby, which is why we planned it with enough of a gap for things to be fine going into Beijing.'' She is happy with the way she felt after the race and claimed a difficult childbirth had been more stressful than her last two miles battling it out with Wami.

Childbirth actually was more frustration and pain for me that it went on so long."

10:33am Tuesday 6th November 2007

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