Paula Radcliffe takes official ambassador role

Distance running legend Paula Radcliffe is an official ambassador for next year's IAAF/Cardiff University World Half Marathon Championships. Paula Radcliffe has been named an official ambassador for the IAAF/Cardiff University World Half Marathon Championships in Cardiff next year. Distance running legend Radcliffe, a three-time winner of the IAAF World Half Marathon Championships, becomes the first-appointed ambassador of the event taking place on Easter Saturday 26 March 2016. It is set to be the biggest half marathon ever to be held in Wales and the most significant athletics event hosted in the country since the 1958 British Empire and Commonwealth Games. Radcliffe remains one of the world's most recognisable athletes having retired from competitive running at this year's London Marathon and still holds the women's marathon world record time of 2:15:25, which she set at the London Marathon in 2003. She won the IAAF World Half Marathon Championships three times in four years between 2000 and 2003, including the second time it was held in the UK in Bristol in 2001. Speaking at the Sainsbury's Anniversary Games at London's Olympic Stadium, Paula said: "It is a race that is very close to my heart and I am sure Wales and Cardiff are going to do a great job of hosting it.