At the 1985 Pittsburgh Marathon, she competed alongside her husband at the time, American distance runner Ken Martin; they became the fastest married couple ever in a marathon winning the men's and women's races in 2:12:57 and 2:31:54 respectively. Later that year, she finished second behind Greta Waitz in the New York City Marathon. She won the gold medal in the marathon at the 1986 Commonwealth Games in Edinburgh in a personal best of 2:26:07, with New Zealand's Lorraine Moller in second. A month later, she won the first of her three Great North Run Half Marathon titles in a personal best of 69:45. She ended the 1986 season by again finishing second to Waitz in the New York Marathon. She finished second in the 1987 Osaka marathon, behind Moller, then failed to finish the 1987 World Championship marathon in Rome.