It was three and a half hours into the grueling Beijing marathon that Kathy sprained her ankle. She had been running on a soft gravel path near the Great Wall when her left leg buckled and she came down hard. As she stood up, the sharp pain in her foot was evidence enough the race was over. But she nonetheless hobbled towards the finish line, the constant ache in her side now mercifully forgotten. "I've been through worse," she muttered. "Compared to the HSK this is a piece of cake."