ATHLETICS: Sutton no longer running in the dark

Chicago triumph brings marathon fever to Cornwall.

The letter of congratulation was addressed, simply, to Marian Sutton, Marathon Runner, Looe. It reached its destination.

To be honest, the chances of its doing so were pretty good, given the amount of mail this 6ft athlete generated by her victory in last month's Chicago Marathon. Besides, there are not too many marathon runners in her particular Cornish town, as Sutton knows all too well.

The 33-year-old, who has worked for 14 years as a full-time solicitor's secretary, has nobody else to train with most of the time on her morning and evening runs.

And now the nights are drawing in, limited street lighting means she has to work all four corners of the town, sometimes twice, to gain sufficient mileage. "I'm on automatic pilot," she said. "I can get to all four corners and know I've run for 40 minutes. I don't need a watch."

Nor, in a sense, does she need the $43,000 (pounds 27,000) she picked up in the Windy City after a personal best time of 2hr 30min 41sec had brought her her first marathon victory at the ninth attempt. "Everybody has been asking me what I'm going to do with all the money. I haven't got a clue," she said. With her husband also working, in the local council's legal department, and no children on the scene as yet, she lives comfortably enough.

As soon as she got back to the office, with her poster of a Rover Cabriolet next to her desk, she was asked if she was now going to buy the car for real. The answer was, and is: definitely maybe.

"To me, I've won a race," she said. "It's everybody else who's making a real big deal of it. Looe is a very small community. There's about 5,000 people here. And since Chicago they've just gone mad."

There was the expected attention from local TV, radio and press. There were banners. There was bunting. And when she got home to her front room, there was the Mayor of Looe with a large bouquet of flowers.

"I have had so many cards and letters and phone calls," Sutton said. "The response has been wonderful. Anyone would think I'd won the Olympic gold."

At which point you sense sharp regret. Sutton was controversially left out of the marathon team for Atlanta this summer, when the two women selected alongside Liz McColgan - Karen McLeod and Suzanne Rigg - both had disappointing runs.

"I was told I was left out because I wouldn't react well to the conditions in Atlanta," she said. "And yet I'd beaten Karen in difficult conditions at the Stuttgart World Championships three years earlier. I could be a right grouch about it. Nothing will compensate for missing the Olympics. But I think I have proved my point now."

A week after her victory she met the chairman of the marathon selectors, Alan Warner, at the Midland relays. "He was full of congratulations," she recalled. "I was very polite."

Whether she will be acquiescent to a request to run in next year's World Championships is, however, far from certain. "I will do a spring marathon, which is likely to be London," she said. "I definitely wouldn't do the worlds as well. I don't think there is enough time in between."

She is inclined to prudence in exerting herself, but that is partly because she foresees a career that will continue for at least another four years.

"There is a lot more in me yet," she said. "I don't feel I've peaked." By way of encouragement, she needs point no further than the Chicago result sheet - the first 14 home were over 30 years of age.

Runners such as Joyce Smith, who won top class marathons in her forties, and even Eamonn Martin, still competing at top level at 38, are inspirational to her.

Looking forward to next year, she can expect a new attitude from race organisers and an opportunity to improve still further on her Chicago time - which places her 10th on the all-time British list. "When I crossed the line in Chicago and saw the clock I was disappointed," she said. "I had set a target of running sub-2:30."

Her other abiding target, however, is an appearance at the Olympics after the frustration of being named as reserve in 1992 and 1996.

In the meantime she is working on one other ambition. "The people at work are very good about my running, but if they can be a little more lenient on me it will mean I can run in the daylight." It doesn't seem a lot to ask.