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She gave up running in the third grade after she failed to make the cross-country team. As an adult, she suffered four stress fractures after running two marathon races. Yet, despite the odds, Canadian elementary school teacher Lyndsay Tessier, 41, finished ninth at her world championship debut in Doha on Saturday.

“First and foremost, my plan was to finish standing up,” she told CBC. The excessive heat in Doha had caused 28 of the 68 athletes to drop out mid-way, with many carried by stretcher from wherever they had fallen along the course to a makeshift hospital set up next to the finish line.

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Tessier said she was “frightened” by the conditions, but strategized a plan with her coach, Steve Boyd, to finish the race 15-20 seconds slower than her usual time.

“You see somebody down on the course and it’s just extremely grounding and scary. That could be you in the next kilometre, the next 500m. It was really scary and intimidating and daunting,” she told the Telegraph.