It is six years, three stress fractures and one bunion since Paula Radcliffe overturned the top table of marathon runners by setting a mind-boggling world record. Now, as she recovers from surgery on her right foot and embarks on another race against time, she feels that she can go faster. “With a healthy foot I think I can,” the 35-year-old said. “I've got a lot left in me.”

Radcliffe's health has become an enduring story of ifs and buts. Her two Olympic marathons were undermined by illness and a fractured femur, and it did not take long for kneejerk commentators to add insults to injury. Now she has revealed that she has been troubled by a problem with her right foot for four years.

“Even when I won the world title in Helsinki in 2005, I crossed the line and Gary [Lough, her coach and husband] said: "You're limping,'” she said. “I would have liked to wait until the end of this year to have the bunion removed because it's a long rehab period, but when I fractured my toe in March I decided to go for it. I think it will give me a new lease of life. After winning New York last year, I saw a specialist who said the bunion could be the cause of all my problems.”

Her plans are airborne again. Last year she attempted what doctors deemed “Mission Impossible” by overcoming a fractured femur to race in the Olympics in Beijing. It was a slim chance worth taking, but the World Championships in Berlin in August are less of an obsession.

“I hope to be back full training in June, but I won't do anything crazy that might set me back with regards to London 2012,” Radcliffe said. “I won't go to Berlin unless I'm fully fit.” An attempt to win the New York City Marathon for the third consecutive time in November is also on her revised radar.

Radcliffe has strong views on the bigger picture for Britain, albeit that she said she was “stitched up” by a recent magazine article in which she criticised male attitudes. “Please unstitch me,” she said. “I was asked to make some light-hearted comments, but they were released as a serious issue.” The serious issue is her desire for Britain's runners to train in groups. Already, a group including Mo Farah is in situ at her altitude base in Font-Romeu, France.

“I remember going to Font-Romeu for the first time and it opened my eyes to how hard athletes from other countries were working,” Radcliffe, who lives in Monaco, said. “You train in a group and you have that support network. We definitely need to do more of it. We have to build up the squad system.

“Another problem is talent-spotting. We don't get into the schools. You can't just say British girls don't have the hunger because they might. I bet if you had got hold of Steph Twell at the age of 9 then she would have had the same inner fire she has now. But if nobody knows they are there, then it won't happen.”

In the meantime Britain has found another expatriate star in Mara Yamauchi, who is based in Tokyo and came second in the Flora London Marathon last month. “I was just pleased for her,” Radcliffe said. “She's seen how hard the Japanese work and that's helped, but the thing that has helped her more than anything is going full time.”

Radcliffe was speaking before walking 5km in Battersea Park yesterday for Cancer Research UK. A Tesco ambassador for the Race For Life, the cause is a personal one because her mother, Pat, was diagnosed with breast cancer last year. She hopes to be running soon, though, and has no plans to slow down. Constantina Dita, the Olympic champion from Romania, has warned that she must cut her mileage if she wants to win in 2012, but Radcliffe said: “Every person is different and you can't stand there and say, ‘she needs to do this or that.' When you're as old as I am you learn about your body. I don't want to stand on the start line again without the mileage under my belt.”