EXCLUSIVE : Paula Radcliffe weighs in on doping in sport

‘I want to protect the right of athletes for a level playing field’.

Niamh Maher is joined on the Girls With Goals panel this week by comedienne Alison Spittle and Girl Crew co-founder, Aine Mulloy. This week the gals talk ghost stories and sexy Halloween costumes (30:52) as well as their careers. For our Spotlight on Sport, track and field athlete and world record holder Paula Radcliffe gives her opinion on doping in sport and how she has been fighting to stop it since retiring. Paula has made it a priority over the years to advocate against doping in sport. She has wanted to protect the right of the athletes for a ‘level playing field’ and know that they are competing against people that have trained as hard as they have (25:00). Paula has been working with the Athletics Integrity Unit to aim to give that right back to the athletes. She says "now I’ve got a lot of knowledge and motivation to go in and say ‘you need to do a better job’ so that these clean athletes are better protected and know that they’re not competing against people that are cheating." We also chatted to Paula to find out all about her career and how she got into marathon running. She recalls when she saw Ingrid Kristiansen win the women’s marathon, and remembers thinking "she’s competing right up the front with all of these men and I would love to be able to run like that one day." Listen in to the full interview with Paula below at 17:45, and don't forget to subscribe to get your weekly dose of Girls With Goals... nothing's off limits. Episodes are available to download every Monday morning on iTunes and Soundcloud.