Despite finishing outside the top 10 at last week's Xiamen International Marathon, her first competition after returning from a two-year drug ban, disgraced Chinese runner Sun Yingjie believes she can qualify for next year's Olympic Games at a shorter-distance event.
The Chinese Athletics Association banned Sun for two years in October 2005 after she failed a drug test during China's 10th National Games.
In Xiamen last week, she finished 12th in a time of 2 hours, 38 minutes and 21 seconds, almost 15 minutes slower than her personal best. That practically shut down her chances of qualifying for the Beijing Olympic marathon, as the Xiamen race served as the final qualifier for the event.
The 29-year-old is now pinning her hopes on the 5,000m and 10,000m, events she once dominated in China. She won a bronze medal in the 10,000m at the 2003 World Championships and won both distances at the 2002 Asian Games in Busan. She also won the Beijing International Marathon three times in a row from 2002.
"I will take part in all of the national competitions until the Games," said Sun, who has been living and training in relative obscurity with coach Tao Shaoming in Yunnan Province for the duration of her ban.
"I hope I can make a breakthrough in both the 5,000m and 10,000m. I think I am still competitive at both."
However, things have changed in the last two years since she was forced off the track.
A group of fresh young faces have emerged and, even at her training base in Yunnan, Sun, the former half-marathon world champion, is finding it tough to keep up with her younger training partners.
But she remains hotly in demand, at least from local media. Her parents even decided to take their phone off the hook days before the Xiamen race because it would not stopped ringing.
"I used to run well and I was not well known. Now I cannot run well but I'm under the spotlight," Sun joked after the race. "I was so ashamed to talk to the media because I did not even make the top eight.
"But I decided to face them because there are so many people interested in me."
The overwhelming media coverage is not necessarily a bad thing. For example, she now has offeres she never enjoyed while at the peak of her career, like a major sportswear sponsor, an invitation from a college to study, an apartment in Beijing, and a promise of a decent job after she retires.
But what she craves most is the good old days, when running was plain, old-fashioned fun.
"I asked myself many times (during my ban) if I really love running - and the answer is 'yes'," she said.
"Now I'm finding my feet again. And I'm starting to enjoy it."
